EUROPEAN NUMBERS INFORMATION GATHERING
AND MONITORING ASSOCIATION
Our Address: Enigma Newsletter
e/o 17-21, ChapcS Street, Bradford
West Yorkshire BD1 5DT, ENGLAND
Via E Mail: MIKEC@PRAXIS.CO.UK
Via Facs imile:
UK: 01274 - 390725
Overseas: + 44 1274 - 390725
ENIGMA is the journal of the European Numbers Information Gathering
and Monitoring Association..
... V
ENIGMA is a non-profit making association of listeners who monitor and
gather information on 'Number Stations' and other related radio
transmissions. ENIGMA aims to bring together listeners and enthusiasts
and provide quality information on subjects not normally available
from main-stream publications.
4 Copies of ENIGMA - are available for £6.00 sterling - includes
postage for the UNITED KINGDOM.
4 Copies of ENIGMA - are available for £10.00 sterling - includes
airmail postage for REST OF THE WORLD.
You may pay by Sterling Cash, US Dollars, Eurocheques or American
Express cheques ( in Sterling > or by UK Cheques or Postal Orders
payable to ENIGMA.
We appreciate all contributions to the newsletter ( including
anonymous inf ormation) . We regret that we are not always able to
provide a personal reply but, rest assured, we read and collate all
Information for present and future use. Questions are answered via our
Letters to ENIGMA ’* pages. ENIGMA is also a discussion forum and we
welcome comments about the newsletter. If you are interested In
writing a feature please contact us at the mailing address.
ilQiilia&lm
Information in ENIGMA may be reproduced, but please mention ENIGMA and
If possible the originator of the article, we would appreciate any
cutting's in which ENIGMA is mentioned.
REX We aim to publish the next issue of ENIGMA in late JULY
1997/
Contr ibufc ions would be appreciated by SATU RDAY JUN E 14fch 1997 .
ENIGMA THANKS YOU FOR .YOUR SUPPORT
ENIGMA 'Recruitment Special'.
GCHQ Seeks Graduate Mathematicians for code-breaking !
DIS Seeks Intelligence Officers ! (at Chicksnnds ;)
/
'V
KHALI SH LAH6UA6E STATION S (Other aciim stations: // direct equivalent
/ "f aaixly ®©ias>@r>
SI) READY READY - Mode AM //M17
So change very stable schedule . Transmissions repeat on two
frequencies at 20 minute intervals.
SAT
2
21.30
4740
04
4460
04
4270
04
MON
2/3/4
21. 30
4740
32
?
21.50
4460
32
22 - 10
4270
32
MED
2/4
19.00
4740
84
19.20
3910
84
19.40
3410
84
2/4
20.00
4740
04
20.20
3410
04
20.40
3910
04
TOE
1/2
19.00
4740
08
3
19.20
3910
00
19.40
3410
06
WED
1/2
22.00
6930
13
4
22.20
6875
13
22.40
5695
13
Sinter frequencies are shown. All reports appreciated
E3) LINCOLNSHIRE POACHER - Mode USB //E4
Transmissions continue between 10.00 and 22.00 each day. Starting at
the top of each hour for 45 minutes. Three frequencies are selected
fro® the list shown below. Jamming continues to affect transmissions
between 10.00 & 14, GO and between 20.00 & 22.45. Jamming can be quite
severe in Europe.
The frequency usage depends on message scheduling. .
Full frequency list is 16475 16084 15682 14487 13375 12603 11545 10428
9251 8464 7755 7337 6959 6900 6485 5746 5422.
E4) CHERRY RIPE - Mode USB //E3
LPs sister station is still active using the same female voice but a
different musical marker.
Reception is variable in Europe. Some other unconfirmed frequencies
have also been noted.
Transmissions at present are Monday to Friday only.
11.00
9263
13866
14469
12.00
8320
9263
13866
13.00
7484
11570
13866
22.00
9263
????
????
Transmissions follow Lincolnshire Poacher format starting on the hour
for 45 minutes.
3
Unconfirmed frequencies include; 10452 13440 & 16104. Frequencies
previously used include; 4766 17499 18684 18844 20474 ft 23411.
E5> COUNTING STATIONS - Mode AM //VS
Still very active in English language.
Following based on reports received since last issue. Special thanks
to Peter in SW. Schedules are short lived and prone to sudden changes.
// Frequencies shown where known.
HON
07.00
7820/9090
WED
15.00
11213/
FRI
13.00
7547/10528
MON
11.00
8014/
WED
16.00
9070/7473
FRI
14.00
10587/
MON
16.00
9219/11491
WED
17.00
9219/7584
FRI
15.00
8085/
MON
17.00
12197/6891
WED
19.00
6780/8085
FRI
17.00
8780/8125
MON
18.00
6970/
WED
20.00
6780/8085
FRI
19.00
5850
HON
19.00
8780/8085
MON
20.00
6780/8085
SAT
02.00
5153/
SAT
07.00
9070/11072
TUB
15.00
7600/10597
THE
16.00
9219/11491
SAT
11.00
8014/10597
TUE
16 . 00
12170/
THE
17.00
8085/10423
SAT
12.00
7547/10597
TUB
17.00
9219/7584
THE
18.00
6780
SAT
16.00
10529/
TUE
19.00
5850
SAT
17.00
6780/
TUE
21.00
5850/7473
SAT
18.00
6970/
SAT
20.00
5850/7473
SUN
05.00
9161/
SUB
12.00
8014/10587
SUN
17.00
6780/ gOS
SUN
07.00
9070/11072
SUN
15.00
8014/11123
SUN
18.00
6970/
SUM
09.00
6970/9070
SUN
16.00
7473/9070
SUN
20.00
7430/
This station also sends
test
tones
and was heard
on *
TUB 29.
10 at 09.30
on: 5315 / 5419 / 6780 / 6880 / 6967 / 7620 / 8085 / 9160 / 10264 / 10727 / 12230 . This
gives some indication of the size of this network.
On Mon 25.11 the U.S. broadcast station WSHB confirmed that it had
moved its European service from 5850 to 5835 kHz due to interference
from this particular numbers station.
EG ft E7) ENGLISH MEN '00000' ft 000 000' Mode AM //S6 ft S7 Families
Traffic levels continue to be high. Due to random frequency usage it
is not practcal to reproduce all logs. ID's noted however are listed
below. See G6 ft G7 for further details.
E8) 105 109 139 192 194 204 320 394 409 471 506 548 592 593 628 675
715 947
E7) 305 319 329 388 419 730 827 843 845 879 915 918
E9) MAGNETIC FIELDS Mode AM //V8
This station is not very reliable, however we suggest you try;
MON 18.00 or 19.00 on 6645 +/-3kHz
SAT 09.20 on 11290
4
Modulation level is too low and therefore despite a strong signal the
reception is not alway readable. See also sister station ¥8.
10) PHONETIC ALPHABET -MATO Mode AM/SSB
Still very active indeed.fi
All information shown below is based on reports received since last
issue. Some frequencies share callsigns.
2120 SPA
3150 PCD
4380 EPA
5230 HIM
6600 STOP
7805 CIO
9403 ???
2270 JSR 2626 ??? 2743 ULX 2844 YHF 2953
3270 HIS 3415 ART 3495 MIS 3840 YHF 4165
4483 FFJ 4665 VLB 4780 MIS 4880 ULX 5092
5437 ART 5530 MIS 5630 KPA 5820 YHF 6270
6660 CIO 6745 CIO 6840 EZI 7322 FTJ 7445
7918 YHF 8405 MIS 8485 CIO 8641 HIM 9130
**#5630 New frequency***
??? 3091 CIO
VLB 4270 PCD
JSR 5170 SYR
ULX 6500 PCD
KPA 7540 JSR
1ZI 9270 CIO
10125 CIO 11565 EZI 12950 SYN 13533 EZI 17410 EZI 19715 EZI
Message strings are still very active. Recent ones include; NDP-V
NDP-5 , HDP-Z , NDP-R , MDP-XX ! All noted on 6600 kHz.
Ell) “OBLIQUE" Mode AM/SSB //S12//G11//M3
231 is still active and was last heard on FBI at zu.30 4fou, Moves
between 3060 4015 4780 & 5050 depending on time of year. Try each
Friday.
Also noted with a good signal in Finland on FBI at 10.30 calling 321
on 7840 kHz. Both the above transmissions will have repeats.
... . so 5 D ? 52/05
All reports of this family very welcome, ^
E12 N N N Mode AM /M2
Ho changes to this station. Still active with excellent signal in
Europe at following schedule.
MON 04 00 4573 MED 04.00 4573 THU 04.00 5821 FRI 04.00 4573
MON 21.00 4644 WED 21.00 4644 THU 20.00 5821 FRI 21.00 4644
An unconfirmed report of an HNS transmission in German <G12) was
received for THU at 07.30 on 6785.
We also asked in the last issue if any readers could ID the data
transmission on 4844. A reader in York tells me it is not listed in
Klingenfuss or the book 'Eavesdropping on the British Military.
Another regular contributor tells me the signal is RTTY Baudot sending
at 50 Baud with a shift of 850 Hz. It is encrypted and sounds like the
NATO CRATT system. He tells me he did listen for some time but was
unable to copy anything to ID the station.
Stop Press - recent information suggests the signal is of Russian
military origin.
5
SIS PH0H2TIC ALPHABET - p re MATO Mode AK/B9B
Reception in OK yery weak.
11.00 18000 BEG 17.00
12.00 17503 WSU * 17.30
12.30 11170 MSA 18.00
13.00 11000 BEG 18.00
14.00 14000 FTP 20.00
16.30 6715 BAS 21.00
I have received several requests to confirm the Phonetic Alphabet
spoken by this station due to poor reception and bad pronounciation .
Ad an. Baker, Char lie, David, Edward, Frank, George, Henry, Italy, John,
King , Lewis , Mary , Nancy , Otto, Peter , Queen , Robert , Susan , Thomas ,
Union, Victor , If i 1 1 i an , X-ray , Young .Zebra.
The original ARRL (Anerican Radio Relay League) 1845 Alphabet says Ida
for I, but this says Italy.
14000 FYS <*)
5834 MSA
5834 USP *
4130 SAR
5530 HAS
4130 MSA
Hot heard For soie
time. Can anyone
confirm if still
active ?
E1G) TUG LETTER (ENGLISH) Mode SSB //G16
Stations AU - Alpha Uniform and MD - Mike Delta are still around
Transmissions are all irregular.
AU seems to have a different purpose to other call signs in this set
up. Transmissions from AU are quite rare but unlike any others in this
family they appear on 2 // frequencies, usually 4821 and 4888.
Transmissions always start on the hour and are repeated one hour
later. Last ID heard was 192.
Mike Delta is also still around and more details can be found in Simon
Mason's column, along with latest operating schedule.
E17 EKGLISH LADY 00000 SHDIH6 Mode AM Probably S6 family.
Likes the random approach to transmitting and appears without warning
at the strangest of times. Seems to give good reception in the USA
Reports received since last issue.
TUE 5168 02.00 '823' NED 4030 02
5460 02.15 '285'
{*) Different weeks .
15 '389' THR 4027 02.15 '638' *
THR 6870 02.15 '638' *
SUM 8100 14.10 167'
Full list of ID's heard over the years;
124 167 168 208 274 276 295 347 372 389 482 531 561 636 638 657 893
823. Only 274 ever seemed to receive lots of messages, the rest don't
seem to receive more than one or perhaps two messages.
SIMMLMffiSMGfi.
G2) SWEDISH RHAPSODY Mods? AM/SSB //M
SJe would stll be interested in hearing from any reader who would like
to take on the task of monitoring this station. We can provide special
logging sheets for Swedish Rhapsody. The job would be ideal for
someone with lots of time and who enjoys complicated schedules !
The details below represent recent logs only' and is not a complete
schedule.
THE :
SCHEDULE
STAR!
DAY
TIME
FREQUENCY
SAT
09.00
8188
SSB
SAT
12.00
6507
SSB
SAT
22.00
3825
SSB
SAT
22.30
3825
SSB
SUM
00.00
5748
SUM
00.30
5340
SUM
10.00
8188
SSB
SUM
11.00
8188
SSB
SUM
12.00
6507
SSB
SUM
20.00
3823
SSB
SUN
21.00
5340
SUM
21.30
4832
AM
SUM
22.00
3823
SSB
SUM
22.30
3823
SSB
MOM
13.00
8200
MOM
17.00
5748
AH
MOM
17.30
5748
AM
MOM
19.00
5340
MOM
20.00
5340
MCW
MOM
22.00
5748
AM
MOM
22.30
5748
AM
MOM
23.00
5748
AM
MOM
23.30
5748
AM
TUI
18.00
4195
MCW
TUE
20.00
4195
MCW
TUE
21.00
3823
MCI
TUE
23.00
3825
SSB
WED
09.00
4195
MCW
WED
13.00
6200
AM
WED
17.00
5748
AM
WED
17.30
5748
AM
WED
20.00
5340
AM
WED
22.00
5748
AM
WED
22.30
5748
AM
WED
23.00
5748
AH
WED
23.30
5748
AM
THU
18.00
4195
SSB
THU
19.00
5340
MCW
THU
20.00
5340
AM
THU
21.00
5340
AM
THU.
22.00
5340
AM
THU
23.00
3825
SSB
1
2
3
4
S3
*3
*3
*3
S3
$3
*3
*3
s
%
s
£3
*3
S3
$3
*3
S3
*3
*3
S3
#3
*3
*3
S3
*1
*1£
*1C
S3
*3
sic
*ic
*1C
*1C
SIC
*3
*1C
*
£
*IC
*1C
*1C
SIC
si€
sic
SIC
sic
*
*
*
£
£
$3
#3
S3
s
*1C
sic
*xc
SIC
*1C
SIC
*
s
*IC
*1
sic
SI
*1C
sic
*!C
Sic
*1C
sic
S3
*
*3
♦3
S3
♦3
♦3
S3
*3
*3
*3
7
Important note ;
s
, i
t
Transmissions currently on 6200 will move to 7314 for summer.
Transmissions currently on 5748 will move to 6200 for summer.
Please send in all logs of this station. Remember Week 1 starts on the
first Saturday of each month. Mote also that no transmissions take
place on Friday.
Can any readers tell me if the string of UUUUU's and L0L0L call sent
by Swedish Rhapsody HCM mean anything in standard call language ?
Other none number stations have been heard to send LQLQ .
G4) 3-MOTE ODDITY - Mode AM //M29
QRegelar slots found at present are :
SUN
20.05
SEP
3930
OCT
3280 NOV
<21.05)
3270
DEC (21.05)
3285
SUN
20.35
SEP
3830
OCT
3180 NOV
(21.35)
3170
DEC (21.05)
3185
SUM
21.05
JAM
3230
FEB
3245® One
report of
3 Mote
OCT 08.20
SUM
21.35
JAM
3130
FEB
3145®
FRI 6210
MOM
13.30
SEP
5507
OCT
???? NOV
5108 DEC
: ????
JAN 5076
MED
*’ "
••
"
•« it
»« ••
~
•• €4
See also sister station M29 - VDE
G6) GERMAN LADY 00000' ENDING Mode AM//S6 Family
Sends all messages using PAIRED groups. Uses regular time slots but
seemingly random frequencies. Messages are repeated on a different
frequency following first airing.
MOM 19.00 & 20.00 Frequencies range between 4 Mhz & 11 Mhz.
TUE 19.00 & 20.00
SUM 10.00 & 20.00 IDs not know.
G7) GERMAN LADY 000 000 ENDE' ENDING Mode AM //S7 Family
Sends all messages using SINGLE groups, uses 3F or 4F decode key. Each
transmission is repeated on 2 further frequencies. Nil messages are
repeated only once. Frequencies and ID's are changed each month on
some networks .
Recent logs include;
TUE 06.30 THU 06.30 SAT 09.00* (*) This is a repeat but with
NED 06.00 FRI 19.00* a different ID !
A once monthly transmission on SUN at 08.00 has also been noted on 11.8
15.9, 13.10, 17.11, 15.12 & 12.01.
ID's heard over last four months include 101 132 140 164 167 198 214 224
421 428 516 562 577 621 764 771 895 915
© m 32.7s
3i75
s
Gil) ST8ICH Mode AH //E11//S12//MS
(•» *
Regular Slots, but changes frequency without warning. One ID active
at present : 752 Others probably about but very difficult to find.
496 is active in both voice and MCW, but only Morse heard recently.
WEEKLY TOE 21.00 3823 4015 4780 or 5050 Calling 7S2
WEEKLY WED 08.00 S430 or 7840 Calling 752
G16) GERM AM TWO LETTER STATIONS Mode SSB/AH //E16
Please see "Simon Mason Writes' 8 for some further 2 - Letter news.
Traffic fro© this set up is very low at present.
At the time of going to press only WL and GK are active in German and
MD A A0 in English.
Frequencies are selected from the following list ; 2690 2707 *2745
3228 3262 4543 4594 4821 4888 5015 5182 5732 5770 6765 6853 7404
7532 7661 7752 7858 8063 8173 9040 9325 9450
10170 10460 10500 10740 11108 11545 11617 12092 12210 12314 13362
13752 13775 13890 14622 14945 15610 16055 16620 16414 17430 18195
18575 19295 19755 20240 20350 2Q875 22885
GK is the most active call still in use and was noted on 3262 4543
4594 5015 5284 5732 5770 6853 7740 8063 8173 9040 & 9323 during the
period OCT S6 -JAM 07.
ENIGMA appreciates your reception reports comments news and
information for inclusion in the newsletter.
We would also be pleased to receive newspaper clippings and copies of
news articles concerning espionage matters, these are not for direct
publication but are very useful for keeping abreast of events and
providing background information when producing the newsletter and
writing features.
If your subscription is due for renewal with this issue may we request
that payments are made payable to 'ENIGMA'.
The next issue of ENIGMA will be published in late July 1997,
contributions would be most appreciated to arrive by Saturday June
14th 1997.
In the next issue of ENIGMA ;
'The Counting Stations' come under the spotlight.
'Ifhich European intelligences services are on the
up A which are not l '
Plus all our regular features.
9
SLAVIC I. AMAH AGES
S2) DRUMS & TRUMPETS - Mode AM /E17/M17?
ha^rbeeruiabl^t^^ trans * isai °" «ot appear. Since then m
nave »een unable to find any sign of Drums * Trumpets. It may still he
around but the 19.30 4740 kH* transmission on ?he 9th of eacS month
seems to have ended. Any reports appreciated.
f 6) L S P r ,? U f SIA8 MBSf ' 00000 ' & 000 000' ENDING Node AM
See GS & G? for further details.
56) Family : E6//E177//G6//V6//N 14/S25
57) Family : E7//G7//V7//M 12
changes Still very active on a wide range of frequencies
Schedules can be very protracted, tailored to requirements of
change dUal addressees and frequency usage and IDs prone to sudden
L^? C r^" eWSPaP !f report on President Yeltsin's visit to Chancellor
Kohl to discuss the expansion plans of SATO concluded that Russians
n tens if y mg pressure on, and espionage activity in. Eastern Europe.
ff ^ i?. s noted D-va (Northern Russian Voice) 254 292 341 417
S6> ID s usual voice 382 624 691 805 852 867
S7 > I0 's 168 471 571 736 812
58) YT Mode AM //M27(BTV)
t? b ® off I air at Present, it is not unusual for it
r* M l "* P eriOM * of silence, Frequencies to check are 4425 A 4755
Reports appreciated.
S12) CHERTA Mode AM //G11//E11//M3
changes° tlVe bUt like a11 fanily ,eBbers is Prone to sudden frequency
Try 1st & 3rd NED of Month 21.00 4015 or 5180
Try 1st MON of Month 21.00 3823 or 4465
Call 971
Call 755 *
Transmissions may repeat in the morning.
♦Not heard recently, all reports of this station appreciated.
S13 & S14) RUSSIAN COUNTING MEN/WOMEN Mode AM/SSB
513) Most transmissions are of only 2 minutes duration. Noted at
»ED 05.00 12124 Consists of 'live' counting and announcement.
514) Still a few around. Consists of a repeating loop tape which goes
on tor hours on end.
Recent logs have included:
NED
SAT
SAT
19.00
14.00
20.00
4064 'Klever
3875 'Gora
4329 'Zubr
75'
43'
23'
SUN
SUM
10.00
17.00
4329 Zubr
3875 'Gora
23'
43'
to
Vassily in Moscow asked if we could explain the data node signal which
is on 3875 when S14 doesn't use this frequency ? The signal is RCI72
Moscow 1 a facsimile which sends meteorological traffic.
516) OLX Mode SS8, Morse Call Up, and //MS QLX
Still operating 23 hours per day -
Transmissions start at 5 minutes to each hour for about 20-40 minutes.
About 50/50 Morse and voice messages.
Mo changes to the schedule.
Daily 17.00 to 22.00 5301//8320 //I 14 16
00.00 to 04.00 5301//9320 //11416
05.00 to 16.00 8 14 2// 14977// 18303
A cassette recording of OLX sent to ENIGMA from Germany provided a
most interesting observation. The particular transmission carried a
double message, however, no indication was given at the beginning of
the transmission. This effectively means that the recipient must stay
tuned until the very end.
A recent press report from Prague suggests that Stanislav Devaty,
acting director of the Czech intelligence agency, resigned amid
allegations that it spied on a senior cabinet minister, raising
tensions days before key elections. < Reuters)
517) CZECH LADY “CONTROL" Mode AM
Again no changes to this station.
Daily 13.55 to 14.02 4485/5027 - single 5F message.
S21) RUSSIAN LADY Mode AM //M45/M17/H50?
Still quite active, although we have not received many reports this
time round. Regular schedules.
HQN
19.45
5290
Calling 491
Messages
for
342 used to eommenee
TUE
17.40
5740
Calling 342
with
the
group
00000 ; from New Year
THU
17.40
5740
Calling 342
this
changed
to
55555
THU
19.45
5290
Calling 491
THU
20.45
3160
Calling 402
SEE M45 FOR IMPORTANT MEM REVELATIONS.
S25) RUSSIAN MAN "CONTROL" Mode AM /S6 Family
Daily at 08.00 on 14890 ID always 615.
08.20 on 11270*
♦May not move here if 08.00 message is non - standard, i.e. S25A/B.
11270 may or may not be used thereafter.
S25B format becoming more frequent.
On TUE 14 January a record 5 hour transmission of S25B was noted.
SI
OTHER LANGUAGES
?2) SPANISH LADY 2 or 3 FINALS Mode AH //M8
Very active, particularly during period 03.00 to 09.00.
<1
%
H0M 03.00 6827 *
THU 02.00 4018
SAT 00.00 7583
MON 03.00 4507 *
THU 04.00 7482/8970
MON 04.00 6786
MON 05.00 8012
THU 08.00 7970
THU 09.00 6795
SUN 05.00 7726
MON 06 . 00 4028/6795
THU 10.00 4028 *
THU 10.00 6787 *
SUN 06.00 4028/8786
MON 07.00 5417
MON 09.00 6927
SUN 07.00 5417*
SUN 07.00 8086*
TUE 02.00 9140/9093
TUE 06 . 00 8906
FRI 02.00 5238
FRI 02.00 6983
FRI 03.00 7482/6855
FRI 04. QO 6255/6768/6855 +
MED 02 . 00 7890
WED 03.00 6826
NED 08.00 8924
NED 11.00 5903
FRI 04.00 4479
FRI 05.00 4028
FRI 09.00 7728
FRI 10.00 6785
FRI 16.00 6855
(*) Indicates 2 freq's
with different msg's.
(+> 3 // freq's in use
for sane message .
On Friday 17.1.97 a rare format double message was sent. We have noted
a recent increase in transmission length, most are now around 45
minutes in duration consisting of 3x150 group mssages . Thanks to Tom
in U.S.A. for logs.
Y5A) COUNTING - SPANISH 4F
Just a couple of reports received.
POSSIBLY DAILY 02.00 5238 For ID 335
POSSIBLY DAILY 03.00 6802 For IDs 015 303 629
V6) SPANISH LADY '00000' ENDING Mode AM //S6 Family
Part of the S6 Family. See G6 for further details.
Shedules frequently change but gives a strong signal in Europe.
Last heard FRI 12.00 14970
V7) SPANISH HAN ENDS '000 000' Mode AM //S7 Family
See G7 for further details. Quite busy at present. Transmissions noted
HON 20.00 Frequencies sometimes used for 1 month then changed. All
TUE 06.00 transmissions repeat messages on two further frequencies.
WED 06.00 Nil messages are only repeated on one further frequency
FRI 20.00
SAT 04.00
ID's noted ; 117 130 144 273 365 398 407 514 519 578 609 610 621 653
663 726 925
12 .
V8) EASTERM MUSIC STATIQ8 Mode AM /Kfl
■* «*
This station is related to SS the 'Magnetic Fields' outfit.
The language used by ¥8 is Arabic, and uses mixed single digits and
multiple numbes.
Single Uumbers in Arabic are - (1) Wahid (2) Ethnain (3) Thalatha
(4) Arba~a (5) Khamsah (6) Sittah (7) Sab-ah <8) Thamaniyah
(9) Tes-ah.
Transmissions seem to take place on the first FRI and first SAT of the
month, however this is inconsistent and the station has been noted
operating on MOV 2nd, DEC 7th and FEB 8th.
The FEB 8th broadcast tape was sent at double speed making the whole
transmission impossible to copy unless you can write very very fast !
1st or 2nd FRI 08.20 11290 +/- 5kHz
1st or 2nd SAT 18.00 8645 +/~ 5kHz Try 18.00 or 19.00
(19.00) 6645 +/- 5kHz
I have received some very interesting information from our blind
listener Christian (via Andreas in Germany). Christian tells EHIGMA
that the music used by this station may be from the Syrian guitar
player Omar Korshid (and his orchestra). The guitar introduction is
typical of Korshid. Christian continues that Korshid is a Syrian but
this does not mean that the station is connected to Syria, his songs
are popular all over the Arab world including Lebanon, Egypt, Libya
and also Iraq. The records are produced in Greece.
V13) MEW STAR BROADCASTIHG Mode AM
The only Hew Star Broadcasting frequency which seems to reach Europe
with a readable signal is 8300 which can be heard in the afternoon and
evenings.
Heard with a weak signal in both the U.K. & U.S.A at 12.00 8300
Other known frequencies used by this Taiwan based station are 9725
11430 13750 & 15388.
XPH HIGH PITCH P0LYT0ME TRAHSMISSIOHS - Mode AM/S7 family.
Still some regular time slots in use. Changes from UTC winter time
back to BST for summer. Frequencies are changed most months.
Transmissions noted at ; May adjust to Summer Time. This could
suggest that many of these are aimed at the U.K. ?
TUE/FRI
21.00
M0?
TUE/FRI
DEC
TUE/FRI
J AH
5431
5754
5754
5131
5254
5254
4031
4454
4454
WED
07.00
WED
07.00
DEC
07.00
JAM
5413
5754
5754
5131
5254
5254
4031
4454
4454
$©v©r'»l mi&t&kmm hatv© been noted with the Polyton© transmissions , Th©
station appeared on MOM 2.12,96 in addition to the regular Till
broadcast .
Peter in Saffron Walden told us about a major mistake on FRX 6.12.96.
He writes "I parked the receiver on 5754 just before 21.00 expecting
to hear the first tone transmission, but instead an M12 CM station
came on; sending 724 724 724 1, ck/ge 218 51 218 51. This was repeated
at 21.20 on 5254 and 21.40 on 4454 kHz. On FIX 13.12.96 the Poly tone
turned up again as expected".
This raises two interesting points. First confirmation that as we long
suspected. If 12 and the Polytone stations are the same set up and
secondly the revelation of the ID and group count in plain numbers.
Readers who have studied Polytones will be aware that they do not give
a group count, this would effectively identify the tone sequence of
say '51' in this particular case and it would then be possible to
break into the tone sequence and convert it back to plain numbers. An
effect of Polytone is to build in an additional layer, making it more
difficult to even read the numbers without a decoder. It would be
interesting to know just how all the technology behind sending
messages works. Is there a large switching centre which is capable of
sending the coded messages in RUSSIAN GERMAN ENGLISH, SPANISH, C.lf. &
POLYTONE and even selecting which voice style and whether it is male
or female all at the flick of a switch ? Mho knows
X8) The 6 Tone repeating stations are still very active. No schedule
has ever been established. Some transmissions have been known to
repeat within the hour.
It is well worth staying on the frequency once the 6 tone AM signal
ends. On odd occasions a short string of Morse is sent followed by an
FSE message. This sometimes occurs about 30 seconds after the 6 tone
signal leaves the air.
Due to pressure of space we were unable to squeeze all your letters
into the 'Letter to ENIGMA pages'.
CONTINUED FROM LETTERS TO ENIGMA-
Thanks to V in Devon, David in Essex, Sven in Linkdping Sweden, Van in
Merksem, Belgium and Godfrey in South Africa. All wrote asking about
ENIGMA.
Marcel in France tells us that he found a numbers related matter in an
issue of Megahertz magazine <?), he says - 'I found a reference to
number stations in which the writer mentioned that he had been
interviewed (on a different subject) at an FM radio station. By chance
he had met M Alexandre de Marenches, a former director of the SBICE -
who was visiting the FM radio station on the same day. He asked hi®
about number stations and the answer was "some things must be kept
secret, no further comments !** (sounds like a familiar answer).
And last but not least, Brian in Sussex sent me a H&rrap's Serbo-Croat
phrase book, he tells me it was not very expensive for obvious
reasons. Me will end with a phrase from page 44.
°0vaj me covjek slijedi - this man has been following me "
14
MORSE STATION NEWS
by M.G.
(All 8 ini n ?,?C e ! mb i e thi f fcim ® ~ straight into the news,
on tlrssl) active fro ™ least October
iu E li m l/T REVEALING NEWS I As always, this station is
itinLtn * Urpri ** s - In «id“Dec ember the final group of
standard Ml messages changed from -feeing a seemingly random 5F
g up to a group based on date of message compilation and
group count less one. The third figure is always a «ri? “e
In rL« 0 ?^K f n thBSe n °^* d occur * d on th ® 'A' network 1800 slot
7 / St * ndar f . 40 ® roup «®*®* 0 ® ending with the
Sith all A-; thil representing the date of compilation - as
imnivfli A thi < bein ° th ® same as d *te of transmission,
liftK c an *^ S “ , of ^gency. The 39 being 40 less one. A
Ulnllm tn b gleaned .re* this developments the earlier
oJ ? 2 SIndInt 9 r ?i?, ffleSSaeeS al *° St c « rt **"ly contained a number
Of redundant filler groups as the final group can clea-lv ht*
spared to fulfil this rather pointless purpose. If date of
traasaission and date of compilation are always the same, why
bother sending this information? The GC is given twice in the
preamble and twice in the ending so why on earth give it again
in the fma. group - albeit minus one, which presumably omits
j. sak ® ? J s Tt intended to make the unitiated believe
*eBsaoe? rS Surh Si ™ yS 8rOUp in this ..'typical form of
the Much e*ore could be said about this, but this isn't
f!*. * im ®‘ Lon 9 inning 'B' network messages continue to
ISxt Is*b^inri da ? ° f a° mpil * ti ° n fr ° ffl one "*'**' to the
*. no indication of month is included, the month of
b ® co '! ,es a,n 53 iguous. Why should only the date
_ n tt «r- exampl * of this is the Saturday 1610 slot to 325
unoreredsrJJort^ ^ wnich since 25th Jan has been sending . an
unprecedented §7 group message every week and is still doing
so at the end of February. The final group is 22056, compiled
c “~; - presumably,
is Standard rr 220 ?n >* rewains " Another oddity is that 325
linn*- k 6C Z 3 L VPe= The P r ®*®nt msg is nearly twice as
on 9 r- br ® aks tl ?® ru\pml Very occasionally this happens
on B network transmissions.
We've not finished with this fascinating station yet. A while
ago I mentioned end-of-month style variants being reported at
odd times and unrelated to 'A* network EOMs. At last, I have
found some of these and they are even more bizarre too These
f “• *» 7.x 0700 ^x^hz! ” mx^ ”
«3 33549. (retuned as I'd previously caught another one
dLhe 6Se els ® wher ® ! >-**- 5f groups * 123 9 * Hi and three long
ole rliirMr 0 ?** M ® anwhil ®. 5175 there was the other
T 307 5 AASS * ID element - the ID was 307.
307 36455 * 333 ^4633 $ 333 885Q3 ill 999 $
(expecting a message to follow I was fooled by another ill)
ill 213 10 * 23456 (interesting! ) 90484 32038 82776 82018
48440 18472 72044 84010 04720 * 213 10 $$««#$$etc. No ending!
This short msq contains no fewer than five 84s and three 72s
and is unlikely to be of a random nature. It serves a very
different purpose to normal Hi messages. The lack of ending
was significant for more was to come after 5 minutes of
silence. At 0715 came 307 56612 (this first element sent 11
times) 307 (error) $*$37sec 111 999 $I0s©c ill (again, as
before - no mistake) 213 10 ~ (repeat of 0700 msg) * 213* ID
#$i5s@c ill and again three long dashes. This time it really
had ended. On the following day at 0705 on 4515 it popped up
again. This time X caught an ID. It sent the first element
231 231 231 55769 55769 for three minutes. Nothing further
followed within the next 20 minutes when I gave up on it.
Nhat does ail this mean? All elements and operational codes
are of the same pattern as normal E0H trs but there are many
peculiarities: Non-random groups, inexplicable scheduling
(using their second transmitter again), A & B element 5fig
groups seemingly unrelated to ID, very low GCs, 3 long dashes,
final group of m&g does not conform to new date/GC style,
repeating of msg, that suspicious first group and those decode
keys 3 123 and 213 along with ID 231 are all a bit much* I
suspect that the form of encryption used in the message
element is of a form which would not require a decode key, and
D&s are probably dummies. At 0700 on the following Tue both
transmitters were active again. 4517kHz a 231 48203 $$20sec 231
54828 «20sec ill 999 **i5sec ill 213 10 * : ( probably same msg
-.-as previous week - poor signal } » 213 10 ®*20s@c 111 and three
long clashes. -A transmission on 5i75 ended two minutes later
with ® 213 iOliOssc ill and the dashes. Was this the same
msg yet again? This network always transmits in pure
hand-sent, riot in the odd MCW used by other Ml networks.
Returning to the relative &&nity of the normally reliable 'A*
network schedule, chaos reigned around Christmas last year.
The expected 1800 & 2000 Tue' slots never materialised '.'on 24th
Dec. Instead, they appeared on Christmas Day, the first time
this network has been heard on a Wednesday. The usual £0M
transmissions followed as expected on the next day. Oddly,
the final groups on 25th Dec showed that the messages were
actually compiled on that day. On the same day a # C r network
msg went out to ID unknown at 1500 on 5320. A record 68 group
msg ending in a random 57483 32 284 68 111 $ 000 $ 333 ( af ter
the end signal). An up-to-date list of £014 trs will be
published in the next issue, along with '8' IDs etc.
M2 No change - same schedule and IDs — as expected.
M3 Usual behaviour patterns. The mysterious 121 has appeared
again with a not-unexpected repeat on the same day. 41 groups
at 0830 on 4722 and 1000 on 5365. 121 tends to be a short-
lived but busy ID and has distinctly different habits to all
the others. ^Active IDs since October: 010 011 012 013 014 015
01 a 017 018 019 040 041 043 044 045 047 121 214 231(E) 496 003
MB 74Unl» ID) 752(6) 755(6) 971(6) 976 Sampled 60s: 51 56
r: -C «4 58 56 57 53 59 52 57 57 59 53 55 56 57 58 41 56 MM
Tf . j- siani f leant that the only SC not in the 50s is 121 s
«ith 5l! Frdqs " in uses 3060 3823 4015 4090 4722 4780 4870
5050 5090 5180 5360 5365 5520 5610 5625 M30 5870 J330 65
6430 6640 7208 (976 - best with BC sta.) 7444 7670 7830 78 .
M4. Probably no change. See 62 for most of these.
H6 (OLX) No change - same schedule and IDs - as expected.
M7 Quite elusive. No change in activity l«vels.
SiO have schedules which by their very nature are very time
=L,“S 22S
m i v sent three times, are hard to conate. h>-U'«
known ares 771 785 803 844 - others exist. The removal of the
10 minutes of rapid dashes last year from this
can only imply one things that the agents/ illegals listening
to their transmissions have now acquired receivers w
freouenev resetting accuracy, making a tuning signal no i°"ger
taver, M7 still retains its tone sequences and
■ modulated" carrier. Why? Because *«*«•££ is i^use^for
morse reader or automatic recording equipment is in use
unattended operation. Tuned to themodulation^equency , t
. initial one minute tone sequence wm trigger .he .eader,
vary short .0 ea S*?* d > ^
minute of tones will close-down : th# reader. ^ . ?
that simple for there ferent the en d of
four of which may ~ be used either the t ° e
transmission, the other m wo being restricted to
«frh«»r They are made up if of two or three elements, dots,
other. mey « rB «“ UE , ^ r be likened to morse
dashes and long dashes and =o®@ can oe aixen
however their timing is not correct for morse.
C .™ . T ; .“the long final d»h , M with . long
JSl £ih (inli it tr start! and M -ith
coniv at tr end)- Ther© are no Ds and no Ks with long^Tirs
rf h Unlike M10, "circuity numbers' are not : used by .
" 1pv Pierce's theory about CNs ©till. stands it is probable
that this. ton. sequences terry so». ‘ ind °* “ he<I ^ Sn ^ r ' P “i
r.:S™rwor^ 1C M~un.ireir P .riil.n^. ere not need
- this would be consistent with the use of automatic recording
equi™n“ Much eore could be learnt fro. concentrated
monitoring and analysis of these stations.
MB A new format is largely - but not entirely - being used,
7~ „Ki«-h three ISO group messages are sent in M ^h
transmission increasing their length to 45min. The 5fig (cut)
used, along.ith those of it.
are not random but have an ID element the ^firs g
A feature is being network.
HiO See also M7. Increasingly (?) active, using a wider
selection of parallel freqs than formerly, making it less easy
to locate- Similar kind of scheduling patterns to H17 but
schedules are far more subject to change. Thanks to Ian
(Dorset) for a log of a record SC on 19th Decs 661-79/79., 42u~
73/25- IDs: 012 249 253 275 314 357 401 408 423 435 .451 571
638 661 667 684 695 738(?) 792 820 835 844 866 873 903 961 983
984 988 997. 'Transmissions may include messages for up ~o
four IDs- Rare variants need looking out for. Some new
freqss 5060//? 5007//4775 5007/ /5470 5295//? 6204//5554
3352//? Highest freq logged so far* 14650
M10C A most interesting transmission on Mon 17.2 4305//?
could mean that the days of discrete IDs are drawing to a
close and we are returning to the Cold War encrypted 5f ig IDs.
Already sending at 1830 MIO was using the S10 format -
probably MIO's original format - but I have designated this as
a C variant. 19 19 18 18 28711 28711 28711 50 50 16 16 «
_ ( 16x5F) = = 50 50 16 16 76526 76526 76526 61 61 17 17 = =
(17x5F) * = 61 61 17 17 000 Are the Czechs responding to
ENIGMA’S interest? - If so, the above ID list could be our
last!
H12 Habits closely follow those of all other S7 family
members. Extremely active as usual. IDs: 016 034 097 137 140
154 197 213 256 289 321 304 315 341 365 399 415 425 462 478
549 577 649 658 715 724 730 749 781 785 .788 794 823 825 826
847 851 888 903 915 936 945 946 952 963 964 995. IDs 658 &
749 ,are': ; 'very : busy - : and^Myj:carry. ; ^ssages to be passed on. by-
other means to several agents.
. 7 ' . . ....... : ' ■ - _ "
M13 A record 80 gro^Sreg ..was 'sent on 2nd Feb (2000:? H-
2100:7535, R - 3.2 2000 %|2100!5733) to 590. This ID is ^prone
to lono messages, 6Cs of #0 or f ; ispre are not -unusual . *t also
sends Its iessage on ther jlst , 7&i3rd;Sun , « Mon of each^ month,
twice on each day. Like all other IDs, .
numbers change monthly. IDs with last = hearo SNs: 25^/15x
254/155 261/172 272/175 284/147 3S.-/x5l 5x7/ x3u
590/173 714/148 735-000/154 752/202 (Where’s this one been
hiding all this time, the earliest of all?) 823/14684.
000/152 975/148 ' . V--'; ' : : - -. ">
Ml 4/24 Habits closely follow those of all S6 family members.
Very active as usual. IDs includes 104 137 263 325 380 464
482 517 529 537 571 587 671 672 691 738 863 906
Ml 6 (8BY) Still following usual patterns. To be featured in
next issue.
Ml? Probably no change ~ but needs closer attention to
complete schedule. This istation uses a very stable schedule.
Transmissions are never late - always starting^ on time to t e
nearest second. Are Bulgarian intelligence really that well
organised?? Should we he Ready Ready to believe anything we
hear?
Hie - Still on 3B02 doing the usual. Not around , late Feb. -
m&y have moved again.
M20 No reports this, time* This «siear»s little.
HU Still all over the place doing the usual.
H22 ( 4XZ I Just whv are ■ the Israeli navy sending 5fig codes in
mprse many times daily® They m&y operate the transmitters —
possibly - but who sends the traffic? you Id the size of the
navy Justify the amount of traffic? Any information on the
Israeli Navy would be very welcome. New freqs 6607 in mil.
aero band. Navies don't do this but £10 does 1 . (6600 ft 6658)
H25 Has been quit© active over past months with several of
its characteristic bursts of activity. Throughout its periods
of operation all trs. are daily at same time/ freq ©lot. Two
schedules running for some time in December never seemed to
send any messages? 2000 629Q//69X9 null ID 753 ended 19 * 12*
and 2100 5349//6290 null ID 359 ended 28.12. Other schedules
com© and go usually for a few weeks at a ... time - and
f rustrating ly unpredictable. A variant format operated during
October on 7000kHz ( * j at 1000 ©ending different messages
daily. This version sends lOmin of long zeroes grouped in 5s
as a message indicator. This variant doesn't seem to use
.parallel frecjs . One in Dec at 2000. on 3380 -sent lOmin of
55555 ~ this is a null msg indicator, quite rare A with this
variant. In Jan this 'operated "daily at 1000 oh \Slia© (0Q000
‘passages -- each 'time only to" change to Q 8 QO '-for.,.' ;:dlW H as t Vtrvon
: 29th. M23 ■ '.'messages ;are .always . worth . recording Ti « i ;f ul 1 * t Not
only do they " use a non-random encryption^' they • ^'are ;
sometimes made up of identifiable sections ^ith^sign if leant
start/end groups. For example, the 28th Jan 7 tr of this
schedule (40grp) included part of the 50 groupmsg sent on
24th Jan - 16 groups had been taken from th© middle of that
msg and tagged onto the end of the later one. .jA -.schedule at
2200 on 6780// 5349 (odd /even IDs) has Just finished, and
another on© at 1400 on 8307//9285 recently begun -no messages
so far. - ' "f- •
• • - ' , ^ • • ;
H25 (9CKN series). Apart from KKN50 are there any other-
stations of this network still active? Can anyone help?
H26 This rarity crawled out of the woodwork a few times
recently. Very tedious to monitor, for once there it remains
so for hours. It isn't really worth discussing it here; an
article would foe more appropriate. Ne have received useful
logs of this station for some time now, yet I keep putting off
the feature, probably because I have a strong personal
aversion to its habits 8 . For what it's worth, I last logged
it, already running, on 28.1 at 0730 5173kHz and it was still
errJL!fii 025 -fT 1 «*v^ U p. As always 'messages* changed
® ratically amidst most boring stretches. From 0737 to 0935^
all it sent were 98s apart from two 59s at 0930.
S2Z_ — IfilVi No reports of this station, nor S8CVT). It is
beginning to look as if it has become extinct, but it's still
4424kHz tel1 ’ L “ t hMrd M ^ ch ’6. checking iSi &
^2S - i.H £PJ . No change. Messages never heard. Still alleged to
be Swiss Interpol, but no really convincing evidence.
fo°ke^ y * om ®. kl " d of faIl “ back system - does it really need
worth it? " 9 * day ’ 365 days a year? Is the expense
^ S^lr?nn compl&x <"°n-M29A) preamble has been
appearing at 0700 (Repeat at 0730) - 4/5MH* region, several
day * * week * and daily!?) at 1800 and Sundays 2000, both
San^ Z month?’ w 0940 * 5MHZ * AS with 64 * fre <* s and messages
??o2 9 _ montbly » and . encrypt£on is of the came distinctive
y P e * " u ® * 0 Priority being given to other stations, this one
has not received the attention it deserves.
dl A -JPpC «?tc ) Has certain similarities with HEP, but is more
adventurous. Until further information is received these two
will not be included in future. They cannot be termed
numoers stations', but they are mysteries. /i'£:
-..^..-military nets of interest to
find .their elegant complexity'
. SSSLl-YfiP, These are Russian
numbers listeners - I find their elegant complexity ^guit»
lemgmg - but they ■are/^ot^strictly; what . /we are^bout:
- * y a f"® d£s ^ ractioris * ! . May', ; / recei ve "occasional ' mention /ih
future but will not be routinely included. (Harold ”*'■ PZL5
sounds like a similar. Russian Mil . net - the -'. accented fitters
you refer to are actually Cyrillic, the German CH (— — ) being
the Cyrillic X (pron. as in Scottish "lochM.*" ‘ 9
£B?„ ,., ( .P8KX. ihis is no military net despite the 'claims* and
revelations' of our devoted disinformation agents. ^ See
accompanying feature. Its activities ended in October Sand it
..asn t been heard since. This has happened before . Where
does it go? Does another ..station" -take ^oymr77' • "i .&. ./•
M34 This exotic graced us with an appearance on Tue 4.2 and
was already sending at when I found it a t 0830 on 5039kHz
* 31 31 31 10610 43399 04798 29744 90043 06857 80415
86265 03728 73025 43399 * 67 67 67 15410 40391 02302 04543
34437 45059 93682 82413 94938 62690 40391 * 67 67 67
15410. . . . .40391 That was it - this station sends no ending.
Each msg i* repeated once, groups hotV paired, long zeroes,
2f xg IDs ’ Note that the 2nd group in : each message appears
again at their ends, i.e. 43399 > 40391. It was also reported
on Sun 5.1 0820/4053 : 95 61 17 (R5) (22x5f for 95, 12grp >or
61, 24grp for 61 (61 again ) , 12 > 13grp for 17.
7 •; .
cJ t- >- v * ' - - r
• a*.'-,,*-
** M29A March4800 (daily?j;i5
H39 See my sample log in this issue* 1 was incorrect in the
last issue when I referred to this station's randomness; it
now turns out to be more methodical than I imagined , as it is
only recently that I discovered that it transmits every' 15
minutes when operating. Each tr lasts 11 minutes in which an
ID and four 5f ig elements are sent. During a recent burst of
activity, which I intensively monitored for the first time I
came across distinct patterns and the results are included
elsewhere in this issue. IDs last for up to a few days only
and their associated elements may be carried over from one day
to another , the last one being the most likely to do this ~
this trend becoming less likely as we move back towards the
first element - which, in this sample, never carries over.
The first 2 figs of §*ach group are, in most cases related to
both the ID and the element position. The station always uses
two parallel freqs which seem to change on the hour. Those
logged recently* 5005//? 5502//? 5508//? 5300//4026 5560//?
5565//5313 5584// 5284 4024//? As you can see; it never keeps
still! Its schedule eludes me at present. Can pop up at any
time. Logs appreciated. '
M42 nOJL network) Due to its very minor Morse element we
cannot really include this one on a regular basis. Needless
to say, it is still very active. It also plays a very
different role to the archetypal 'numbers station' - it is a
' pseudo-diplomatic ' undoubtedly involved in espionage activity
but communicates between fixed sites, not to agents in the
field. Further information on SOUQ — we don't even know what
it stands for - would be very welcome.
M43 C6XM8/C37A group) This seems to have a similar sort of.
status as n42 but is not a SQUD operation* . -:It-xs still
something of a mystery. Stfhat else links Israel, Germany,
Italy, Cyprus and Russia? Rumours that it may have some
connection with the . Weisenthal Foundation may have more than a
grain of truth in them.
H45 See also Mi. There is .some news on this one at lasts Its
usual predictabilty has recently been enlivened by two
independant developments* i - Along with its sister station
S2i ' s 342 schedule (which shadows M4S entirely apart from
using MS's ID, 150) the first group of every message changed
from* 00000 to 55555. This" change took place on the first
transmission of 1997, and has remained 55555 ever since. 2 -
A more revealing change took place also on 2nd January (the
first 150 & 342 transmissions of 1997) in which the final
message group took on the same form as Ml's final group which
changed at almost the same time. M45's final group indicated
that the message had been compiled on that busy day for Ml,
Xmas Day, and withheld until 2nd Jan. so it clearly had no
urgency until that date or later. This confirms M45/S2i's
links with Ml - something I thought unlikely even though their
formats are the same* This was because there were several
minor but significant oddities unrelated to format. These
24
w @res a) M45's slow auto-keying in ICW as apposed to Hi's
variable speed manual keying in MCW (of a strange kind) b) The
150/342 network's use of the 00000 first group, c) H45' s lack
of a ' standard e group count. Although usually in the low 20s
the GC deviates too often from 20 to identify 20 as its
'standard BC' . This is normal ; it is Hi's strong preference
for GCs of 10, 20, 30 , 40 St maybe 50 that's unusual — like
everything else about that station. 1 hatfe always suspected
that other M45& existed - not only 150, Looking through my
old unidentified Cor wrongly identified) logs I came across an
Mil with the notes, 'auto slow' and '1st grp 22222', This
looks suspiciously like M45. Sun 26,11.94 0800 5455kHz 287-
372 34 22222 llili last group. Sun 25.12.94 same tiroe/freq
287-382 24 22222 . So M45 also has a 287 ID. The speculation
that S21/M45 originate from a breakaway Soviet state was based
merely on the language used and the apparently relatively
recent appearance of S21 . However , this does not preclude the
possibility that H45 was in existence long before. S2I, the
342 schedule at least , merely duplicates M45's message but in
Russian - it may have been added to provide the 'service' to
Russian-speaking non-morse-reading agents Cor whatever) "taken
in' after the break-up of the USSR. Hi has been around since
the 1970s - at least. I am now almost certain as to who is
behind Ml and its relatives, and it is by no means a typical
espionage network. Revealing this would cause considerable
embarrassment to the agencies involved. We must respect their
sensitivities. At least one thing has been cleared ups M45 &
hi, having identical endings, confirms the Endings Rule, . i.e.
that unrelated stations never use the same endings - so
convenient for monitoring agencies who are too slow to catch
the start of transmissions.' Wild visions of an in terna t i ona I
conspiracy spring to mind, where, ; in the early Cold War days,
a top secret international conference took place (in Geneva,
of course) with the laudable aim of 'Standardising of Formats
for the Mutual Benefit of All Concerned Parties' !
M50 New Designation This station, thanks to Guy (Portsmouth)
has recently been rediscovered and is now being- taken
seriously. I first heard this one on Mon 15.5.95 at 1800 on
5431kHz. Having missed the beginning I identified it as a
Standard 6C = 50 Mi, which, in a way, it was. Ian (Dorset) ,
too, logged it as an Ml on 12.10.96. It seems that this
station has .been popping up at the same time/freq ever since
and on any day. It is often very weak and easily overlooked.
It operates several formats and IDs in an apparently arbitrary
manner, is hand-keyed like Mi, often very badly, and sometimes
auto-keyed. It often uses the Ml format and often does not. A
44 inserted after the GC in the preamble seems to indicate
that the following message (so far always 50 groups) will be
of mixed groups, that is groups of 2, 3, 4 or 5 figures. It
has an almost pathological preference for the number five,
sometimes sending messages where 50%+ of the digits are fives*
It can be heard several times a week always on same freq/time ?
but be warned; it is not always punctual and may be up to 5
M50 now heaitf (March) 1820 4947kHz
21
minutes late, and may also end abruptly in mid-transmission .
I have a theory as to its purpose - its habits are not really
senseless at all - it is yet another aspect of Ml - but
further discussion will have to wait for a feature in the next
issue. There is too much to say here.
M51 New Designation This has possibly been around for a while
but has only recently come to our notice - thanks again to
Guy. It seems to operate no schedule and can only be found by
chance always on a different freq and at a different time.
Has been heard Mondays to Thursdays since September* Times &
freqs; -1600/5301 -0910/4843 -0820/5280 -0905/3825 -1200/4835
-1105/5331 (same day as 0910). Ail of these started earlier
than the times indicated so complete format isn't yet known .
Messages are of lOOx 5 letter groups (not paired) using Roman
alphabet, and auto-keyed at c25wpm. A 2fig serial number
precedes each message and is often followed by a single
letter, e.g . NR73 0 18:25:14 1996(msg folldws). The time/year
groups are accurate to the nearest second and are* UTC+i but
take account of local summertime. The serial No cycle is
irregular, NR1 can follow NR24 or NR90 for example, however,
they are consecutive. Transmissions end abruptly in mid-
message flow and can last for over 5 hours. Preambles may
include extra figures, e.g. NR70 D25 09:24:30 1996. It has
similarities to F8K, and needs watching.
M52 New designation Reported by Ian (Dorset) on 10th Dec on
5201.5kHz. Slow morse. Type of zeroes not known. - 08 II
820704 820704 820704 II 30 II 33 AR sent continuously from
1236 to 1253. A similar jmessage' at 1300 - 08 s 830334
830334 830334 : 30 : 33 AR Repeated until 1400. Then at
1400 - 08 s 832334 832334 832334 s 30 s33 AR Finishing at
1431. The II, later written conventional ly as a colon, is a
separation signal rarely heard nowadays. The only other
numbers stations to use »fc are P8K & M23 in one of its several
formats. The 6fig groups could link this oddity to the Two
Day Wonder, M5, which also used very slow morse and,
incidentally, long zeroes.
MX (SLHFMs) Cluster S & C still on all usual freqs 24hr/day
but 4556 can be somewhat erratic - sometimes nothing is there,
sometimes they both are and lately I've heard an unusually
strong S alone. It may just be conditions. L: 3091 with
chirp as always - my personal favourite - it's the only one
with a character of its own! R: 3196//3323//of ten 4325/7
also. R with long dash heard in Jan while the other two were
normal. Vs 3174 most of time, but has migrated a few times
over past few months to 5274 & 4785 (new freq?) - less
irregular gaps recently. The always short-lived Ps have
appeared on 3838 4030 40434050 4080 4898 (new?) 5880/ /6935
5885 5880 6935. On 27.12 an M marker was operating around
5.15MHz, but due to the nature of the Morse M it may not have
been a SLHFB. Leaving the best news to the last, 23rd Jan saw
the appearance of a very rare F on 5042 - it had long gaps
between the letters and a distinct occasional 'glitch'.
ifesLtoring.of M.3.9 sequence over period; 7,8*9.10 Jan 96 - 080Q-Q930UTC
Parallel frequencies not sought*
No transmissions found at 0945.
^IDs 702 & 881 may have had
earlier time-slots before 0800
on 9th Jan«
*Ali IDs on 7th Jan were dropped
by 0800 on the following day*
IDs 735 <& 731 dropped by 0800
on 10th Jan c Also X5S *4440
New IDs added : 259, 640 on 9th
722. 826 on 10th
"ID*
Da te
Time
1st element
2nd element
3rd element
4th element
Slot
702
8.1
1
33174
66380
41565
40786
9.1
-
A
A
l
1
2 elements carried ovei
10.1
1
34068
67352
41565
40786
^missing 9th Jan?
881
8*1
2
31065
55744
60613
26267
A - see note above
9*1
**
A
A 4
i
i
3 elements carried ovei
10.1
2
34348
55744
60613
26267
fmUfftag 9th Jan?
539
8*1
3
06619
91609
74022 x
61723i
2 elements carried ovei
9.1
1
05607
37318
69497 )
28827/
but missing 9th Jan
10*1
3
08857
30726
74022*
61723^
611
8*1
4
43566
78959
01675
43855)
$. element? carried over
9*1
2
42924
71112,
20598 )
43855 S
once* 1 element harried
10*1
4
44564
71112*
20598*
43855*
over twice*
007
8.1
5
56421
81605
35646)
94819)
% elements carried ovei
9*1
3
55372
16419
35646*
94819*
once.
10*1
-
ID dropped
735
8.1
6
55880
82241
18058\
-98789\
2 elements carried oven
9*1
4 \
53187
41046
18058r
98789*
once*
10. t
-
ID dropped
731
8.1
7
82 137
10678
43437
3442 6 \
le lament carried over
9.1
5
90416
66592
02120
34426*
once.
10ei
-
ID dropped
259
8.1
-
9.1
6
66071
16718
83780
48975
10.1
-
ID dropped
640
8*1
-
9.1
7
12755
17718
35926
03960
10.1
-
ID dropped
722
8*1
9*1
•
10*1
5
03220
98079
12467
25737
826
8.1
-
9.1
-
10*1
6
24029
99592
05271
05063
Anomalous groups within same element are shown underlined, where more than one example
is present* First two figures would appear to be related to both ID and element in
most cases*
24
Letters to E.N.I.G.M.A.
A Wff war® welcome to i«au® 12. First of all, we would like to wish
all our readers a Happy Hew Fear and thank you for your support during ,
189©.,
Let's get started, and first off, the subject jaf books. To* in Essex
wrote : 're “Letters” in issue 11, Simon Hason refers to “The Ultimate
Spy Book" published by Dorling Kindersley, selling in the UK for
£16.88, ISBSf 07513 02582. On the shelves of shops like ¥ H Smith and
Dillons.
This book is in M's usual beautiful format, finely produced. I
haven't read it but gather the treatment is quite largely historical,
full of fine illustrations of equipment used in the work. Those who
have read spy books, fiction or non-fiction, would probably enjoy it
for background. I 'a not sure that it is so such for the specialist.
For instance, when Sehimael's “ Underground Frequency Guide" was
reviewed in EMIGMA some time ago, I knew I just had to have it. The
"Ultimate” book I would describe more as a luxury, and certainly very
attractive to look at.
I a® also told fro® a reader in France that Keith H. Melton author of
the book works for the McDonald food chain and is the owner of the
largest private collection of spying equipment in the world. He owns
every type of BWII agent f radio. Unconfirmed reports say that he
recently acquired the whole stock of old equipment from the Special
Operations Executive 1'
Thanks To® for your letter, a review of "Ultimate" can be found in
this issue of BHIGMA. '
Staying with publications, I received a note in the post fro®
Interproducts of Perth Scotland, to tell me that the reprinted version
of Intercepting Bombers Stations - Langley Pierce, is now available.
Have any readers purchased a copy and is it any different from the
original version ?
' . ■ - /
Michael in Staffordshire wrote to comment on Brian in Sussex's
comments in issue 10 (page 48, Para 3), who stated that it was not
possible to trace the recipient of a particular radio transmission.
Hot so, at least it was not so until the advent of the popular
digitally synthesised receiver. In the late 50 's and most of the 60 's
MI5 had a technique, code-named RAFTER, which allowed a suitably
equipped person to determine, from a reasonable distance, if a
receiver was tuned to a particular frequency. It worked as follows:
Receivers of this era used a local oscillator comprising an adjustable
tuned circuit and a valve or transistor. This arrangement was called
a "self oscillating sixer" and no matter how well it was screened
would always radiate tb some degree. In addition a degree of "reverse
modulation" .took place.
These two phenomena taken together meant that a second receiver could
be used to determine if the receiver under surveillance was tuned to a
particular frequency.
2 $
Th@ operational method was to tune a monitoring receiver to the
frequency of the local oscillator in the receiver under surveillance.
When the tuning Has aligned in this Hay the second receiver could
“hear" the signal being received by the receiver under surveillance by
virtue of the reverse modulation.
The signal radiated fro* such a local oscillator could, typically, be
received several hundred metres away and the reception of such a
signal provided irrefutable proof that a receiver was indeed tuned to
a particular signal.
This technique was used by MIS to prove conclusively that receivers in
the Russian Embassy Here tuned to the frequency used by MI5's Matchers
radios. ♦ The advent of digital synthesis has put an end to this type
of surveillance because there is no local oscillator as such to listen
to. There is instead a aaster oscillator and a digital subsystem. All
one gets fro® this setup is digital hash. (+ VHF receivers are far
more likely to produce strong L.O. radiation - M.G.)
As an interesting finals, MIS arranged to have RAFTER equipment
installed in an aircraft and to overfly London in an experiment to see
bos many receivers were tuned to a particular Russian numbers station.
They Here able to establish that, in any particular evening, up to six
receivers in the capital Here listening to the transmission . ' a
Ed note from M.G. (* These RAFTER claims are probably exaggerated in
"Spycatcher ' and are not entirely technically correct. Many receivers
were immune from radiation-especally modulation-being before the
advent of sythesised local oscillators. So called 'self-osillating'
mixers ■: are .and :’were .'..‘only ^luiield in ’doBestic .transistorised •reoiilwM-
virtually never ..used in v: domestic valve receivers. In more expensive
receivers 1 , F "amplifiers -won Id reduce L.O, radiation considerably.
Stabilised and ^decoupled ^‘supplies J mould eliminate modulation. All
superhet receivers radiate ‘=as they : require a local oscillator. "
My Racal RA17,the first 'sythesised' receiver, -radiates to a certain
extent but this frequency is not directly related to the received
frequency nor to its modulated. All synthesised receivers radiate. Any
survelXane© receiver can be used .to time the period of .this radiation
i.e. mhen did it appear and disappear, this information can be used to
correlate with known number station transmission periods. Mor’ is it
beyond the bounds of possibility that received frequencies cannot be
identified, however , it would be technically a lot more difficult. The
only 'safe" receiver is the simplest - the T.R.F. where no local
oscillator is used. As long as the detector operates below the point
of oscillation, no amount of technical wizardry can detect the
presence of one of these receivers. Many professional Russian spy
receivers were of this type for this reason.)
Thanhs for that, Michael, and also your notes about the BIO station
STM, I hope you will enjoy our update in this issue of KRIGMA.
Mow on to Lincolnshire Poacher and a letter from TF in Cleveland. He
starts - 'I follow many numbers stations but in particular the one
entitled by your group The Lincolnshire Poacher (E3), mainly : on 1154b
kHz On this frequency I have rarely heard any form of jamming and th©
preamble is definitely not a glockenspiel (which translates as
“bellchimes" ) .' tiV ■ : ' : V.vr > > ;;
The two-note preamble and the Lincolnshire Poacher tone itself are
undoufotafoly played on a peculiar instrument called a Calliope
(pronounced Kal-li— opee and literally meaning: beautiful -voiced ) .
Only of G„S. and Canadian origin this instrument is a steam organ;
hence its strange, haunting and slightly breathy sound. It was/ is
mainly found in the U.S. and started out on the Mississippi steamboats
as a source of entertainment on the long river voyages or excursion
trips. On such boats there was obviously a ready source of available
steam and 1 believe the early instruments were played by using the
underside of the clenched fists to push down large "keys". Each key
operated a steam valve which, when depressed, released steam to its
associated organ pipe and played a note.
There were considerable maintenance difficulties with such an
instrument due to the wet nature of its operating medium and it was
obviously not suited to being shore-based; unless you had the means to
produce large quantities of steam. Playing a melody quickly released a
great amount of steam pressure so a considerable head of steam had to
be constantly available.
Some forty-odd years ago I did once hear a Calliope being played at a
steam rally in Redruth, Cornwall, but no doubt this numbers station
electronically reproduces the sound of a real Calliope.
In Greek mythology there is a Calliope who is the Muse of epic poetry.
I think the person who organised this station may have a finely-tuned
sense of black humour 1 Thanks TF for such an original angle on LP.
Martin in Nor t hsmp conshire read about ENIGMA following our feature in
Short Wave Magazine's October issue (more on this a little later) and
tells us that he his quite new to listening and purchased a second-
hand Sangean AT8G3A to listen to number stations. Martin noted an
error in an LP transmission on 23 September at 21.00. The oddity
occurred in the 79th group, the first reading was 48084 & the second
was 48867, Martin had this on tape so is certain of the error. (LP
please pay more careful attention).
P.T.A. in Edinburgh asks if any attention is given to locating the
Jamming stations ? Most Jammers now seem to be based in the Middle
East area. Little or no Jamming seems to take place in Europe
following the end of the cold war. The main number stations which
suffer Jamming are Lincolnshire Poacher (E3) and The Counting Stations
Starting with LP , recent detailed observations carried out in Germany
show that jamming is not blanket in coverage. The country carrying out
the jamming has at least four transmitters in use for blocking number
stations and at least a mediocre monitoring service. We can also
conclude that they do not (unlike some other agencies) read ENIGMA !
The main jamming periods are 10.00 to 14.45 on the three high
frequencies. It would seem to be the case that other more important
matters take the attention of the jamming stations after this time.
This is likely to be the large number of clandestine stations which
target Iran. Voice of the Mojahed is pursued with vigour. Jamming
seems to resume in the mid-evening period, however, not all
frequencies are jammed, this is either due to a shortage of
transmitters or the mediocre monitoring station is unable to locate
the missing frequencies.
27
Due to the complex sliding schedule of message headers used by LP the
jamming is not effective in completely blocking a message. The second
station (E5) Counting Stations used to suffer more severe attack but
in recent years this has scaled down to only occasional jamming.
Certainly a great deal of effort and expense is required to block
number station messages.
We have reported in previous issues that the jamming which effects LP
is particularly strong when monitored in the Middle East.
Any new information concerning the location of number station jammers
would be appreciated. Finally, on the subject of jamming I asked in
the last issue about the new VoA relay station in Kuwait. I a®
reliably informed that it is operating on 1548 kHz MW and that the
transmissions in Farsi are indeed jammed. This information was also
confirmed by Kim Andrew Elliott on the VoA programme "Communications
World" .
Our correspondent tells me that both he and Kim Elliott agree that MW
is easier to jam than SW, due to the fact that shortwave propagation
of the jammer is unstable. In a report Mr Vladimir Osrogorsky, long
time head of the German service of Radio Hoscow was once ordered to
write a piece about Radio Liberty and was therefore allowed to listen
to the broadcast for a period of time. He went to his weekend home (
known as dacha in Russian, a kind of bungalow) near Moscow where it
was possible to listen to Radio Liberty - with problems, but it was
possible.
How on to the ENIGMA feature which appeared in the British
publication. Short Wave Magazine in October 1996. First, our thanks to
SW Magazine for taking the decision to publish the feature, in Britain
the law concerning listening is quite clear and as we have said
previously number stations have always had a very low profile in the
British radio press.
The response from readers was excellent and we received a stack of
letters subscriptions and enquiries. Existing ENIGMA readers were very
pleased with the finished results. We must, however, apologise for a
few gremlins which found their way into the feature. Due to the long
lead times involved some ENIGMA updates and corrections did not make
it to the final published version but none-the-less the end results
were very pleasing indeed. Thanks again to Short Wave Magazine.
It is not possible to mention everyone who wrote in but please accept
our thanks. 1 would also like to pass on thanks to David in
Peterborough who sent details of ENIGMA to the World DX Club. We have
had lots of letters from WDXC members asking about ENIGMA.
Greetings to Neil in Bath who wrote to WDXC asking for an explanation
of these strange transmissions and who was pointed towards ENIGMA,
also hello to Robert in Essex and Simon in Shropshire who first
encountered number stations in 1871 while listening to Radio Northsea
on 6205 kHz. - This often had interference from Swedish Rhapsody on
6200 kHz.
Hello to W in London who found his first copy of ENIGMA a 'truly most
interesting, informative and intriguing read'. Also greetings to Paul
in Surrey who has listened since the late 1960 's.
26
Thunks* to P of Horif ordehir© ~ h© Bays he enjoyed very much the
special section in Short Wave Magazine . He goes on to say that he
first heard a numbers station in the late 1950 's in the “’tropical
band" - the "call up” consisted of a not very melodious sequence of
notes on a piano and the language was possibly either Slavic or
German .
P also mentions the high signal strength of some stations and remarks
on good reception of the Counting Station <B5). We shall be running a
major feature on this station in the next issue (13) of ENIGMA and
will include your comments concerning transmitter sites for this
station .
A quick mention and thank you to Clive in Cornwall. We appreciated all
your contributions to our Alpha Phonetic station (110) feature in this
issue. He tells me a story which has been circulating in number
station circles for years and years, but I am certain some readers
will not have heard it.
Clive says ‘*1 was once told that the Two Letter Stations (E18/G16)
were in fact the German equivalent of oar National Rivers Authority
reporting the levels of pollution in Germany's rivers and lakes ! ** .
I would really like to know who started some of the rumours, others
are recounted in Simon Mason's book 'Secret Signals' and include 'the
weather forecasts for the Swiss Alps (Swedish Rhapsody i ) plus perhaps
international banking transactions or even secret government
communications with UFOs i Any aliens capable of reaching earth are
unlikely to have one-time pads, however, if they did turn up on
Christmas Day they may wonder why the streets are deserted and we are
all sat at home around a dead tree ? Clive, keep up the good work.
Mho was the first numbers station listener ? Well Andreas in Germany
may have tracked him down
The following is taken from a feature “Kurzwellenpanorajaa" (Shortwave
Panorama) about one of the most interesting Austrian radio pioneers,
Anton Habsburg. He was born in 1901 and as a little boy became
interested in radio. He had a room, built some equipment and learned
Morse code. Because of his position in the Austrian monarchy he had no
judicial problems with his activities.
So he made some QSGs (radio contacts) with the Austrian military
station in Vienna. His first activities were during Mil, when he
became involved in numbers transmissions. He regularly tuned to the
coded messages from the enemy stations (around thirty pages of
material each day). These were FL~ “Tour Eiffel** from Paris; ICI from
Cotona, Italy; MSK from Moscow. These stations exchanged coded
messages- He always wrote down the numbers and on his way home from
school called at the Mar Office.
He handed over the messages to the radio operator there, saying "I
can't use it, not knowing the key, but if you can use it - if not
throw it away.” The department “Militarchif ren” (Military chiefs*’)
consisted of three groups: Russian codes (under Viktor von Marquesetti
, Romanian codes (Captain Cornelious Sabu and Italian codes ( Major
Andreas Fidl). Fidl became chief cryptographer of the Republic of
Austria after WWI, and after 1938 (when Austria became part of
Hitler's Third Reich) became advisor to the cryptology departments in
fascist Germany.
2-9
The numbers were always checked and they were found to fee correct, on
one occasion the antennas on the receiving station could not operate
due to heavy frost (this occurred at the VoA Greenville site last
winter ) * so they could not receive the messages. But they had
Habsburg's copy of the message which they could use.
Mas he the first numbers monitor ?
Hore quick thanks - first to Alan in Solihull - logs always
appreciated, Ian formerly of Perth who has now relocated to Dorset,
quite a move, hope you are enjoying life at your new location. Thanks
also to our readers in Russia including Vassily, Ivan and Zikin.
Thomas writes fr am Germany - 'I would like to congratulate you for
your work including so many details. Thomas comments on the following
(from the last ENIGMA) - PSZ : MFA Paris, FDC: French Airforce Met z,
HEP: Interpol ZOrich, PBK: Coastguard, Netherlands (from:
Spezialfrequenzliste,Siebel-*Verlag, Germany). Thank for the logs.
Staying on the subject of HEP - following comments made to ENIGMA by
the Swiss PTT about the protection of privacy - Andreas asks whose
privacy are they protecting ? John in Derby tells us that the 10th
edition of the International Frequency Handbook shows HEP as Interpol
and this is also repeated in the British - based Shortwave Magazine
which recently reported HEP? on 6871 kHz and HEP was also noted on
8400 kHz in SITGR.
The rumours that HEP is Interpol have been doing the rounds for many
years but have never been confirmed. Has anyone anywhere ever heard
any traffic from HEP ? I am also interested in something called the
go code", this is a system used to confirm the launch of a nuclear
weapon .
Not a pleasant thought, but if a country is to launch a nuclear weapon
the instruction must be passed in a secure manner, this, unlike a
James Bond film does not involve pressing a big fat red button. In
such an event the messages would be sent on a variety of bands
including YLF,HF, VHF,UHF,EHF and SHF by land-based, aerial, orbital
and shipborne transmitters. I don't want to go into great detail but
it is possible that some stations which we hear on HF sending idling
calls 24 hours per day may form part of such a system. Candidates
would certainly include the FDY, FDC, FDG A FDI family of French
stations.
HEP may have a similar purpose to the "go code' system. The station
operates 24 hours per day and sends no traffic . Does Switzerland have
a Nuclear device - does anybody know ? They were certainly developing
nuclear weapons in the 1950 's.
Switzerland is very nuclear conscious with bunkers for the civilian
population and in addition all new homes built after 1960 (approx)
have a nuclear shelter. Could HEP perhaps form the basis of some kind
of internal early warning signalling system for the authorities to
communicate ? Comments very welcome.
Greetings and thanks to Gert in Holland thank-you for your letter.
A very detailed letter from Fritz concerning our feature on the 14403
station ~ ENIGMA 10 & 11. Fritz says - 'when Malt decided to check H32
he did not choose an easy one as this net shows many characteristics
of a "'normal" Morse net of the Russian (CIS) armed forces.
3o
Until the early 1970s one could assign i&rs&w Pact Horse nets to army,
navy and air force- All used different preambles and habits~the Czech
railways even had plain language and it could be seen without
problems, when for example the Black Sea fleet moved around .
Later on everything changed quite rapidly and all over the Warsaw Pact
there was only one phi (with exceptions) of the following format:
“ Msg - number -exact number of groups-date(no leading zeroes) - time of
preparation of message (local Eastern time)-repeat of number -3F link
group(s) or Z~eades = txt consisting of 5L or 5F or 5L Umlaut-last
group". This last group contained the date (day) and number of groups.
In the ease of 5L groups the translation is as follows:
a=i b~2 w=3 g~4 d~5 e-6 v~7 z~8 I~8 k=0
Sometimes the sender or the addressee is mentioned again in front of or
after the pbl.Msg. These are normally advised with a short blind call
ending with AB. All the QRAs consisted of 4LF groups (np "U" and M E"
on the first place and never FFLL or LLFF ) . Urgent msg are announced
with "'XXX" and often consist of Z -codes or some plain cyrilie words.
The nets mostly are of the "guided star" type with the whole traffic
controlled by one of several centres using one of several QRAs. If CQ
call signs are used, the msg's are sometimes sent blind after repeated
announcements. Mode of transmission is normally Duplex and very often
there are day and night frequencies. They may change daily or may last
for years.
Due to political changes by the end of 1989 much of the excellent
discipline disappeared and further modif ications may have also taken
place. Anyway, today one can find many modified QRAs and pbls and 1
believe most of the nets are operated by the Russians. I do however
not know enough about traffic from other CIS members. If, as e.g. on
CISNy5343 the same frequency is used by OHIO nets with 4LF tactical
call signs, but with the same Z codes as the Ny (ZZD,ZGR,ZZU, etc) then
the whole lot is quite complicated to log. I know the problem of the
number of groups which is, of course intentionally, wrong, but could
never understand why.
Professionally operated nets of a higher ranking (I assume) still use
the original pbls and start their text with a series of the same
letter. There are many training nets around as well-most of them are
easy to recognise, because telegram numbers are normallyvery low, the
number of groups is always the same and the centre asks for a repeat
of the whole telegram although they confirm QSA 5. It is of course not
easy to find the second DUPLEX frequency, typically they are only
spaced between 50 and 300 kHz and are within the same MHz. The keying
sometimes is very bad, resulting in errors in - I think - Walts notes.
If you are lucky enough to catch XXX sasg's you may even observe how
quickly other nets are activated and the same message is repeated.
I have never been able to correlate political tensions, seasons or
whatever with the number of these Morse nets. Sometimes there are so
many of them ~ 3 weeks later: nothing heard ! Gone ! Why ? Many of
these COBBS have been replaced by RTTY - we all know the countless
number of CIS 50, 75 & 100 Bd stations sounding very similar to Baudot
mode.
I hope these explanations say be a little bit of help to readers, who
are interested in CIS Morse nets, although I know it is not directly
within the scope of Number Stations. But there may be links between
different nets which we did not yet consider.
Concerning the 14403 net unfortunately I have not been able to hear
anything of the© and therefore my log is nil'.
Thank you Fritz for a very detailed response to our features, good to
hear from you and please keep in touch.
A quick hello to Jim in Essex, he says- "I do enjoy reading the
journal which I find most informative and interesting more so as I
look after an aged and infirm relative and so my listening is now
restricted to very infrequent and short periods and the articles and
news keep me up to date with things.*' Thanks for the kind comments
Jim.
A quick hello also to Ken in Doncaster, hope you are keeping well and
refreshed from your recent holiday in Houston. Thanks for all the MX
information. Staying in the U. S. A. - Tom, (thanks for all the logs) is
hoping to write an update on the US numbers scene for the next issue
(13) of ENIGMA. We will look forward to hearing from you Tom.
More quick thanks to Hans in Germany who sends in some very well
presented logs, and also a quick mention to Tom in Chelmsford, good to
hear from you.
Jacques in Holland asks that we do not make the voice reports too
compact and that we should always show logged frequencies.
Unfortunately space is a 'big' problem with EHIGMA, indeed we have so
much to squeeze in that its almost impossible. In terms of logged
frequencies we always try to give details. The problem is that some
stations just will not stay still particularly '00000' ending stations
like E6/G6/S6/V6. While E7/G7/S7/V7 along with G4 to name but a few
like to change each month. Pleased to read, Jacques, how much you
enjoy ENIGMA.
More news about 'The Laughing Cavalier' from our good friend 'D'.
'The underground radio society that Peter Quintel belonged to was
small and highly secret but I do not know if it still exists because
many of its members would now be very old (Peter was over 70 when he
passed away). It was made up of ex-GCHQ people and SIGIHTers from the
Armed forces who continued their monitoring after they left the
Department and exchanged information on an informal basis. It was not
a formal club and I doubt if there are many people who would admit to
having knowledge of its activities, membership or existence !
Regarding COUNTERCLAN, Peter seldom mentioned this and my knowledge of
this shadowy group is rather limited. What information is in the
public domain is contained in the Peter Wright book "Spycatcher" . It
involved the use of SIGIHT for counter-espionage purposes and was one
of the West's main weapons in the war against Russian spying'. Hope
you had an enjoyable holiday in Scotland '0'.
Several readers have written in about "The Brotherhood” stations.
These are a vast networks of Russian and former Eastern Bloc countries
which operate under the banner of the little known S0UD. Thanks to
Leslie in Sheffield and Tom In the U „ S . A . for the logs and details.
I r» November 1986 Chief Technician Douglas Ronald Britton of the Royal
Air Fore© pleaded guilty to 5 charges of passing secrets to the
Russians. His case was largely heard behind closed doors but whatever
was said, it earned him 21 years in prison. What did emerge was that
this most cunning and mercenary of traitors was controlled by numbers.
During his RAF career this technician and teleprinter operator had
served in Iraq, Egypt and Cyprus but his most damaging spying was
committed at RAF Digby from 1966 to 1960. He told many lies to Police
and RAF investigators and the precise details of the SXGXNT he
betrayed, how he was "run** and recruited will probably never be known.
He probably started spying in Cyprus in 1962 due to the large debt he
had accumulated but his most serious damage was inflicted when he
returned to the U Some people believe that he may have started
spying even before he left Cyprus as he had a home posting which was
not disclosed at his trial, but was perhaps Digby. He was trusted by
his superiors and regarded as a highly skilled technician. He was also
regarded as quick thinking and utterly reliable and passed his P V with
ease .
He said that when he was walking in the Science Museum in Kensington
in 1962 he was approached by a Russian radio listener who was
interested in shortwave. Ho said that this was his first meeting with
a Russian contact. They talked about amateur radio for 10 minutes and
the Russian asked him if he could get a copy of the manual for the
T1154. This was an obsolete trnmsmi tter which came on the market after
WMII. The Russian contact, mu id he could give him instructions on
meeting a new contact in Cyprus where he was shortly due to be posted.
In Cyprus he was asked to supply data on the people he worked with
such as their sexual orientation and drinking and was called to
meetings by being sent a card. He received varying amounts of money
after each meeting and ho probably lied about the precise sums he
received which he said were? a few hundred pounds. The Russians told
him that he was not producing enough material and constantly put him
under pressure and said they were fed up paying out money for no
results. Britten also said that he was beaten up by them on a few
occasions. They also showed him a photograph of himself receiving
money from a Russian. He was told that it would be sent to British
Intelligence if he did not continue supplying information and work
harder to collect it. One meeting he had with the Russians was held
cruising around Famagusta in a diplomatic car l
In 1986 he was posted back to Digby in England and he met the Russians
at Arnos Grove in North London after his return. His controller was
"Yuri" who was Alexartdr Borisenko, a Cultural Attache at the Soviet
Embassy. He was given a sheet of paper containing a callsign,
frequencies and instructions for encoding and decoding messages which
would come by radio from Moscow. He was also supplied with a camera
disguised as a wallet and it had its own lamps thus enabling it to
operate in total darkness. It could take pictures by being wiped over
a document to expose the f i 1m. It had a fault though and he never used
it and did not even destroy the instruction notes as he had been told
to do by the Russians.
His one-time-pad had each page numbered in the top right hand corner
and each page had 6 blocks of 10 five digit groups. He also had 2 beer
cans with false bottoms, a piece of piping and a magnetic container
concealing information by sticking it under a seat. The Russians also
supplied him with a Minox camera.
3 $
Much RSS made at the tine that he wan a Radio Amateur and in th» iqro
edition of the RSGB Amateur Call Book he appeared a^ Col S iiT-!? 2
with the call G3KFL. I„ later edition, heTopS Smtar? ™k"
The Russians probably found out about hi. via aaateur",dlo Ld^ad
presumably been selecting suitable hams in official !
targets This he said was how the Russians approached ^i® but he did
not explain how they new his callsign when they met him at the museum
his house at Digby he had equipment which although not excessive
could transmit and receive signals from Moscow. He denied ever having
“f d J 1 ® transmitter to pass information to the other side however He
admitted using the Digby Amateur Radio Club Room to receive a message
from Moscow as he spent a lot of time alone at night enLed on K
hobby. It appears the messages Rare sent to hiss in CM
Feb?uarv a i9B8 h ® ® issed a rendezvous with his contact in
February 1968. They were supposed to meet in Pinner in North-West
London. He went to the Russian Consulate and delivered l lettef asking
a “ er . he !? ad te ^honed them. In his LLphone caU ^
f°, contact and was told that there was nobody there who
*.ould hexp him The ca*l was undoubtedly intercepted and he was seen
the building, thus bringing about his downfall In the
investigated°by tL ElpTSi^b «t that he had b“n
in his detection bee '" ,S,! ° f hlS dobts “ d this "suited
( Interest ingly , Britten worked at Digby at the «s*»m** o -
worked at Gate. kupplyine it with i^orcepL ^^iL ^ouU ao on t^be
an even more mfajnous traitor who was also controlled by numbers.
fiis trial in November 1968 was mostly in camera (private) so little *s
SlSmSS-S* he he pl8aded guilty- Much information about
" operations ana RAF communications was passed to the Russians
an« he had an unusually good memory and thus was able to pass
information verbally. The nature of the material he handled at Digby
his ld ® ake * his relatively easy. His damage was serious and
sole °£ deS Wa ? described as “ingenious and sophisticated" . His
a h ? Pying ? as money and nobody could believe that he was
a traitor. He only received a few hundred pounds for his spving wh*~h
even toaay remains obscure. He remains an ENIGMA 'D' .
of fhe S Sqf -? L i” C ° 1 2 Shi 5 e is amongst other things the home
of the 591 Signals Unit which has special dispensation' by the DTI to
covertly listen m on mobile phone calls made by Forces personnel.
591 Signals Unit already performs a variety of electronic surveillance
tasks, including intelligence-gathering, communications security and
checking that classified information on computer screens cannot be
picked up from outside RAF stations. The unit's traditional role has
been to ensure the security of RAF communications, performing
defensive monitoring of RAF radio frequencies and their own
telephone and fax systems to spot people discussing classified
material on open lines or frequencies. It runs a fleet of mobile
monitoring vehicles. Digby has long been home of 591 S U & 322 Signal
Squadron - which specialises in HF SIGINT. e.g. Russian Airfore It
co-operates elosley with G.C.H.Q. and other military SIGINT units.’
34
KGB SPIES k HOLIDAY OPPORTUNITY
by Carey Scott in Moscow
Fed up with the usual tourist guides to the world's capitals ? Want
something a little nore exotic than a potted history of the Sacre
Coeur ? Sone retired KGB agents hoping to put their experience to good
use while supp lessen ting their pensions say have just the thing.
The KGB Tourist Guide to the Cities of the World, being released in
Moscow, is not your average Baedeker. The introduction note tells us:
. f he , re f der f liX not be the ordinary tourist - he will find out about
the best parks for secret meetings, visit the restaurants frequented
by top KGB agents, and wander the spies' favourite routes."
The alternative guide seems part of an unprecedented public relations
blitz by the Russian foreign intelligence service, or S^R, which
launched its own CD-Ro® of Russian spying history recently with
personnel files, photographs and interviews fro® KGB archives.
The authors of both, blessed with greater glasnost than their MI6
colleagues, see no reason not to commercialise their hard-won
knowledge. Mikhail Lyubimov, a former London based agent, said
recently: I know London better than MI6, and MI6 knows Moscow better
than I do.
He and his colleagues have compiled reminiscences and observations of
cities from Rome to Bangkok, with un-usual tips for visitors and
warnings ,or tourists about local eccentricities.
Russians in London, for example, are warned by Lyubimov about that odd
British penchant- for muesli, regarded by most Russians as rabbit food.
hLSL 1 ”’ T bu ^- 1 ea , it ’’’ says L yubi®ov. "It'S good for the
digestion. Lyubimov also advises would-be drivers that, unlike
Russia, cars do not stop at zebra crossings and British policemen,
unlike their Russian counterparts, are unbriabable; and it is
explained that milk can be delivered to your home.
Lyubimov who professes to be a fan of fish and chips, waxes lyrical
about Harks I spencer - “that democratic cheap store" - and the
pleasures of pushing prams around the Serpentine in Hyde Park.
Portobello Road market, beloved by Russian shoppers for decades is
SS a ? USt f“ r , those in search of everything from clothes
to Brussels sprouts, which are un-available in Russia.
For those hoping to tread in the footsteps of Soviet secret agents,
London Zoo is recommended for secret assignations. From past
experience however, Lyubimov warns would-be spies not to feed the
animals, which can attract unwelcome attention from zoo keepers.
the Brit?«h a «=J,.t lb F rt i f recommended so that "you can see what
Lyubimov 1Sh St 16 fro “ other P laces during their days of empire", said
For food he suggested the Chinese restaurants of Soho. And the
his eye sharpened by years of trying to go unnoticed
m London crowds, advises his Russian readers to be careful of the
colours of their cloths. English gentlemen, he lectures, never wear
brown .
36
If ail this fails to amuse Russians, they can buy the SVR'e CD-Rom, a
which promises to lure readers into the deepest secret s of the Soviet
past, all for £25. “We figure the Russian taxpayer has a right to know
what we get up to/ 9 said Yury Kobaladze, spin doctor supremo of the
SYR and the brain behind the CD-Rosa tour of the intelligence
corridors.
Hot surprisingly, the CD-Ro®, available in Russian and English, is
thin on exactly what the SYR does these days - though viewers clicking
through the disk can access files on history ranging from the Soviet
pursuit of the atom bomb to the recruitment of the Cambridge Five and
the building of the Berlin Wall in 1981.
Rot everyone shares Kabaldaze's enthusiasm. He admitted: “A lot of the
old veterans ask, 'Why, what's the point?' 1 '*
However, Kobaladaze reckons that, just as the CIA recruits on American
college campuses, “the CD-Rom could provide some good advertising, to
get young people to come and work for us“ .
The disk also gives the once silent Russian spy network a chance to
promote the Russian version of history. English bookshops, Kobaladaze
complained, are crammed with the West's version of the cold war -
including those, most irritatingly to the the SVR, by British double
agents such as Oleg Gordlevsky, once Lyubimov's deputy.
“It's time we put across our side of the story/* said Kobaladze,
instead of just reading translations of Gordlevsky.”
If any readers have any further details about these two products
please let us know and we will publish information on stockists and
prices. If you have managed to obtain either item we would be happy to
receive your reviews.
Karikatur. Rainer Hachfel
Hr Yeltsin here :
“If you are James
Bond, I'm Feliks
Dzhershinsky . .
Thanks Andreas.
A Look at F8K (M33 3
by M»G
This station made its most recent reappearance in March 1996
and operated daily until the end of September, This seems to
be one of its charac terxstics. Transmissions conformed to a
simple reliable schedule commencing at 1900 and ending at 1930
on two parallel freqs: 5760 & 6960. A repeat tr was sent at
2000 on the same freqs. Messages are further repeated twice
two days later, and yet twice again two days after that.
Transmissions are of two forms - 5-figure and 5-letter — which
usually alternate from one day to the next and each consists
of six messages averaging 44 groups each to quite a close
tolerance. Groups are not paired, and long zeroes are used.
Although keying is automatic, errors frequently creep in and
may or may not be present in repeats, e.g. occasional &fig
groups within a msg where the first figure is duplicated.
These sort of errors are not of the human sort, and have much
in common with those found on FDC, another suspect French
station. Keying speed gradually increases as the transmission
progresses, as if it needs to keep within the 30min period - a
highly unusual characteristic .
Figure messages are sent on odd-numbered dates of the month,
and letters on even dates. If the month ends in an odd date,
then two consecutive figure trs are sent, otherwise letters
and figures alternate. Format varies between the two* Both
share the same 3min call: WV VVV VVV DE FBK PSK P8K « Figure
trs are very simple and begin with the GC for the first msg
followed by the message itself. E.g. GR43 (43x5f groups) ~ B
The next msg would follow similarly^ with the final message
ending 22 (without the B) QRU QRU AR AR .
Letter trs have additional preamble elements in the form of
serial numbers and date/time groups etc. e.g. NR67 R 261031 Z
GR40 (40x 51 groups) = B, the 6th msg again ending without the
B, GRU QRU AR AR. A separation signal (XI) may be sent before
and after the R in the preamble (see M52 for a note on these).
Formats are not entirely consistent but this would seem to be
the intended form. Serial numbers are consecutive, and return
to 01 after msg NR99. Dates of compilation are never more
than three days before the first date of transmission and
often share the same date.
Two other suspect stations with similar bogus callsigns are
P7X and P6Z . The former, a morse station, also uses the II in
its preamble but its QRA type call is more in the American
style. Recently using 8039.5kHz at 1400 (daily?) it uses 5-
letter groups. Typical formats Call; QRA DE P7X IIPII
101400 Z GR120 ~ (120x51) First & last grps identical . Ends =
AR. Sends same msg repeatedly for several hours. Rumoured to
bs a U.S. forces training station* this would seem unlikely as
it has so many similarities to F8K . The other odd one is
P6Z uses 15873kHz amongst others, FEC-A 192baud 4O0Hz
shift •“ has been identified as being under the control of the
French MFA at Paris* Undoubtedly involved in secret
intelligence operations, .as it doesn't use a legitimate
callsign* PQK is almost certainly connected with French
intel 1 igence/speciai forces activities in Europe*
Below is an illustration of its operation during the month of
July '96* Beginning with my arbitrary transmission serial No.
to indicate each new message group, followed by dates in July,
average message group counts, letter msg serial numbers and
ending with letter msg compilation dates*-
1 fig 31 ( Jun ) , 1 , 3
2 let 28 , 30 (Jun ) , 2
3 let 4,6,8
4 fig 5,7,9
5 let 10,12,14
6 fig 11,13,15
7 let 16,18,20
8 fig 17,19,21
9 fig 23,25,27
10 let 22,24,26
11 let 28 , 30,2 ( Aug
12 fig 29 ,31,1 (Aug
41
46
NR65-70
26Jun
45
42
NR71-76
2Jul
44
43
NR77-82
iOJul
45
43
44
NR83-B8
i5Jul
46
NR89-94
22Jui
46
44
NR95-01
28Jul
Therefore sixty messages originated in July; this would be
typical of any other month. Any more information or ideas on
these stations would be welcomed. Thanks go to GO
(Portsmouth) , BR( Sussex) and Chris Smolinski for providing
material for this article.
IMPORTANT - SITE INFORMATION
by H.F* Adcock
For some time now ENIGMA has been aware of the location and
operating agencies of several numbers stations. For reasons
we cannot yet disclose we have chosen not to publish these
details. However , we do need these details confirmed
independant ly by subscribers without official access to such
information .
Locating sites need not be as daunting as it appears
especially where stations with predictable regular schedules
are concerned. Techniques are a mixture of basic detective
work, common sense, intuition and luck. First of all a list
of all HF sites within a particular country must be compiled.
Over half of these will be receive-only , some of which will be
involved in monitoring and identifying unknown transmissions —
including spy 'burst' trs. Sources are very varied* 1) Most
national mapping agencies indicate large HF sites on their
maps by a cluster of mast symbols. These must then be
36
identified on the ground, and either eliminated or put an a
suspect list. 2) Local in f ormation , gossip, rumour - all can
be fruitful sources. 3} Published information - government
directories, planning app 1 ications , internal 'House' journals,
historical memoirs and biographies ( a very fruitful source
for information about the, usually WW 1 1 , origins of many
sites), union journals, even telephone directories can be
useful. 4) Field strength tests around sites will instantly
pinpoint whether a transmission originates there, or not.
5) Innocent, and often unconnected, press reports can
sometimes give away gems of information - especially those
referring to post-Warsaw Pact military 'shake-ups' in Central
Europe. The range of sources is as wide as the imagination.
With a little effort in the field many loose ends in the
Numbers scene can be tied up. We should, therefore, view
site location as being of equal importance to monitoring.
Using these methods I identified virtually all HF sites in
Britain during the late 70s/early 80s, some of which were
being used for espionage transmissions . Not all of these
sites were marked on the British Ordnance Survey maps, despite
their great size. It was some of these that proved the most
interesting. After the end of the Cold War several of them
changed their roles, their controlling agencies or even closed
down. NI6/FC0 sites, run by HMGCC, have been extensively
rebuilt at enormous cost. There have also been great changes
in some CSO (Composite Signals Organisation - the civilian
monitoring arm of GCHQ), military SIGINT, NSA sites and the
DTI site at Baldock - all of which are involved in covert
in ternationa 1 radio operations. If you would like to see
articles on such sites - historical or contemporary - why not
do a little research in your own country and send us the
results?
Our thanks go to our subscribers in various government
agencies for supporting us in our work. Your con tr ibu tions
are always appreciated. if. numbers stations are solely what
we "suppose them to be" as a British DTI spokesman admitted to
the Daily Telegraph newspaper recently, then there should be
no need to pretend that they don't exist - they should all be
legally registered as such with the ITU. In fact they are
concerned with more than espionage alone, a fact which that
particular official was almost certainly unaware of.
(Photos sho^y the Composite Signals Organisation Station at Cheadle, Staffs*
one of several such sites: main entrance and HF interferometer aerials.
Summer 1996)
39
E.NXG.M.A. Bookshelf
THE ULTIMATE SPY BOOK
Keith K. Melton
Published by Dorling Kindersley ISBN 0-7513-0256-2 Large format
full colour- Priced in the U.&. at £16-99. Available through i-H. Smith
and at smaller branches by special order (about 4 days).
It is difficult not to praise this book so we apologise now if this
sounds like an advertisement rather than a review !
The book is prefaced by William Colby, former CIA Director, and Oleg
Kalugin, former Chief of KGB Foreign Counter Intelligence .
This book tells the story of famous spies through history : who they
were, what they did and how they did it. Details are given about
undercover operations such as the daring exploits of the SOE during
World War II, the intrigues of the Cold War, and present day
intelligence gathering.
Of the many books which are devoted to espionage, very few ever show
pictures of the equipment used by clandestine agents. The reason is
that such equipment is of a highly classified nature.
The idea that information about such equipment should reach the public
domain is a threat to the intelligence services and the
acknowledgement of such equipment could provide valuable information
about the activities of opposing agencies.
The Ultimate Spy Book certainly lives upto its name - beautifully
illustrated with over 600 high quality colour photographs showing all
aspects of the secret world of espionage.
Each item is pictured with a short description. Amongst all these
objects you will find : clandestine radios, concealment, cryptography,
photography, secret weapons, sabotage devices, electronic
surveillance, lock picking, letter interception techniques, bug
finding, microdots, escape evasion, etc... who could ask for more ?
Staying within our number stations hobby, ENIGMA readers will be
delighted to find descriptions of the type II MKII and type A MK III
suitcase radios, MGR1 receiver (SOE), SSTR1 (OSS), SE100/11 (Abwehr,
attache case radio used by the CIA agents during the 1950 's, a KGB
radio of the 1980's Delco 5300 miniature transceiver (CIA), German
FE-10 miniature SW receiver of the 1980's allowing 'sleeper' agents to
monitor his number station and a radio with GRA-71 burst encoder used
by the SAS.
If all that's not enough there are also KGB burst tapes and a one time
pad used by SOE agents.
If you like espionage and clandestine equipment, this book is
absolutely a must for you. Keith H. Helton is an avid collector of
such specialist equipment. This book brings you a visual museum of the
kind of equipment you are unlikely to find anywhere else *
Marcel „
4-0
=
“Things That Go Buzz In The Night
Its that tine once again to listen to all those unknown buzzes and
bleeps. Welcome along to another of our "Things That Go Buzz In The
Night" pages.
HAARP PROJECT
Despite all the attention given to HAARP the British media and Short
Wave press don't seem to have taken any interest. Across the Atlantic
the debate continues about just what the HAARP project is all about.
ENIGMA readers have commented-
First Tom In the USA. "There seems to be quite a bit of controversy
regarding this facility, but from what I've seen there doesn't seem to
be much substance to it. From my experience with the military, if
there was anything secret about this project at all, there would be no
pictures taken of it. Also, looking at the picture of the sign on the
fence in the Monitoring Times article, there is no barbed wire atop
the fence. If this project were classified, the area would be
surrounded by a security fence with armed guards. Of course, it's just
my opinion that the US government doesn't have any "secret plans" for
this station (at least not right now)".
Marcel in France adds-"In my humble personal opinion there is no risk
to mankind from the HAARP facility".
We would still be interested to hear of any information concerning the
times/frequencies and also the mode of HAARP transmissions, information
of this kind seems very lacking froe the project team l
THE BUZZER
Quite a mixed bag of feedback following our feature on the possible
location and use of the Buzzer 4625 kHz (occasionally other frequencies) .
First, Brian in West Sussex. 'Your article on the possible use of "The
Buzzer" as a status indicator for the Chernobyl reactor is well-argued
and seemed to me to have ring of truth in it. It presents the best
theory to date, which seems to fit all the facts. While reading the
article I found myself recalling a documentary on one of the UK
nuclear power stations aired some while ago. Throughout the programme
could be heard the relentless pulsing sound of a klaxon operating
within the plant to indicate the safe status of the equipment. While
this in itself is not connected, it is a curious coincidence regarding
the use of a very similar indicator to signal a nuclear "All s well
status
More positive evidence of that Russian connection reached the ENIGMA
office with a letter from Richard in Buckinghamshire. During the
Summer Richard visited the C.I.S. and reports. "I took with me my new
Sony SW100E; it's very good. I was especially interested in the origin
of the so called 'Buzzer' station on 4625 kHz. In Minsk (where it has
been reported as coming from) it was extremely loud in my hotel room
in the afternoon and evening.
41
But in the morning it was a very faint signal. The rest of my travels
were mainly in Azerbaijan, Armenia etc, and around the Black and
Caspian seas. In all these locations the 'Buzzer' was audible, but
weak, and became weaker the further south or east I travelled. Upon
reaching Moscow I tuned in on arrival at my Hotel (in the City Centre)
and to my amazement, the signal was so strong that I had to switch the
attenuator in and also disconnect the aerial, this was the only way
the radio didn't become overloaded. So I'm convinced it originates
from the Moscow area."
Andreas in Germany was unconvinced by the suggestion that the signal
could be heard 24 hours per day at the suggested receiving site in
Austria. He did riot feel that reception would be too good during
daytime hours.
I have noted a fair signal as early as 14.00 UTC in England ! And
finally for now, I decided to write to 'Moscow Mailbag' at the Voice
of Russia World Service just to see if they would pass comment on the
'Buzzer'. The reply was - well, shall we say, disappointing.
Moscow - "Dear Sir, First it was the "Woodpecker" now it's the
“Buzzer". 1 asked the engineer in charge of transmitters and was told
they know nothing about it. Sincerely, Joe Adamov."
I will leave you to draw your own conclusions. I did also ask for the
address of the organisation which controls radio transmissions in
Russia, but they ignored that bit totally !
FADKRS
These particular signals are still very active and can be heard on a
wide spread of frequencies. We have not made any further progress xn
the identification of these unusual signals. It is worth noting that
only one organisation or country seems to use this mode.
Thanks to readers who sent in logs. Richard, you are on the right
signal, but Derek, I think you may be tuned to something else.
Tom in’ Chelmsford told me he had given up on these ! Don't give up
Tom try early evenings using the list below.
Fader frequencies noted since last issue of ENIGMA (many others are
probably active) -
Please
note
that frequencies aay
vary
by +/-3kHz.
3191
4020
5090
6505
7658
9125
10142 13431
3217
4082
5195
6825
7813
9138
10480
3382
4457
5313
6878
7997
9225
11100
4478
5328
9245
11517
4496
5400
4563
5468
4845
5788
We are still very keen to learn more about this unknown mode, its
purpose" and locations. Any information/observations very much
appreciated. For new readers Faders operate on a 1 minute cyc,e and
have a 'glitch' every 7.5 seconds. They sound rather like a motor-bike
engine. The reason they are called Faders is due to the peculiar habit
of dropping to a lower level and then becoming loud again.
42
The 1 ninute cycle in broken into eight -7.5 second burnt®.
Depending on the transmission in progress the signal performs any one
of three distinct actions -
Carries on at full 'volume' I Readers with a very accurate clock will
Drops to a lower level I note that transmissions follow a clock
Stops and stays silent I cycle starting at 00.00 seconds.
Transmissions cam restart at any tine and so don't be fooled by
periods of silence, stay on frequency or check another channel.
Reception is particularly good in the late afternoons and evenings,
when up to 8 transaitters nay be operating at any one tine.
Slowly sweeping 'faders' have long-operated on HF bands. Leave a
receiver tuned for long enough on ora® channel and one of these will
eventually materialise. They have a rough F.M. type sound, unlike the
pulsed and pure carriers we usually associate with ionospheric
sounders . Can anyone explain these ?
In the last issue we asked about 'Park Hill* and received a very
detailed reply fro® Tia which is reproduced below.
The Parkhill series devices were developed in the 1960 's, and phased
in over the 60s ft 70s for securing HF,VHF,ft UHF SATCOM voice circuits,
using a time-domain system that secures traffic up to Top-Secret, but
allowed for the basic cadence of the secured voice traffic to be
recognised. Parkhill also is not very good over ^ noisy circuits with a
lot of fading. One improvement allowed for diversity/non-diversity
node (easily distinguished by pre-sable length to monitors), yet the
JJ.S. guTBramat was eager to phase oat the Parkhill f sally of voice
transmission-security devices with a more robust system.
Enter the Advanced, Harrowhand Digital Voice Terminal (AHDVT ) . AsDVr
is actually a liraoser, because in addition to processing and securing
analogue voice, the system also is compatible with record-mode
circuits.
Users consider AHDVT to be a tremendous improvement over Parkhill,
particularly on HF. It also allowed for other TSSC (such as XY-58
'Vinson' family VHF/UHF crypto gear) systems to be removed, reducing
weight and saving space on the aircraft and ships, as well as ground-
mobile ft fixed locations, crytographic key management is streamlined
with AHDVT, but there is one downside, the importance of which depends
on some particulars involving voice- traffic.
AHDVT vocodes (digitizes) the analogue voice to digital voice using a
codec that works well on narrowband (i.e. HF/SSB ) circuits, this
product then fed into a KY-89 encryption unit to secure the digital-
voice, after which it is fed into the communications circuit (radio or
telephone) . The process is, of coarse, reversed on the receive side of
the link. But the deciphered audio is a mechanical voice. . .you do not
have voice recognition !
This is not a problem when the message (traffic) is the only factor,
but there are plenty of times when the messenger is just as important.
For example, the Air Force One Communications Systems operator can
pass some sensitive frequencies to the CS0 aboard MIGHTHATCH 01 via an
HF AHDVT circuit without voice-recognition being a concern.
But if the President aboard AFI wanted to speak with the Secretary of
Defence aboard S&N973 , an iHD?T/Ef-98 circuit would usually be a poor
choice because voice-recognition becaae an important factor ! '
On now to some station news.
THH PIP - Bo change, still active on 3757 kHz and 5450 kHz. It is
often in the early hours of the morning on 5450.
One report from Germany tells a® it 'pips' 65 tines per minute.
Hot exactly GMT or OTC !
THK ECHO - This signal is lost to us at present, it was last noted
under Radio France International on 3965 kHz. The Echo does however
like to move about, but, because of its weak signal it can stay hidden
under a stronger signal for soae time. This station is not that dis-
similar to 'The Buzzer' the only major difference is that of signal
strength. A faster version of this signal has been heard on 3372 &
3386, once using FSS. - about 2 'pips' per second.
BACKWARD MUSIC STATXOH - Sorry, still no real news on this signal.
Seems to have taken up residence on 6752/5 kHz. Also noted on 9223 kHz
during daytime hours. When not sending an appalling noise it just sits
making a low buzzing noise. Also likes 6895 6584 5178 & 3740. Ian, now
at his new QTH, wrote " 5178: This has to be the backward music
station - first time I have heard it. The aliens have landed ! “
TUB GRACIOUS - The only significant change is its ability to now
obliterate Shannon Air Radi© 70LMET on 5565 kHz. This seemingly
pointless sound operates on 5500/5505 and recently turned up for a
short spell on 5308 kHz. Other frequency noted have included 5350 6584
3148 3265 10270 & 12220 ffhat is it 7 Give it a listen. Good reception
after dark .
THE BUZZ - Does nothing but buzz continually. Often heard on 3
frequencies in parallel. Try 5865 @835 7710 8980 9050 11230 ?
THE SffEBPIHG CARRIER - A new transmission reported last time around.
Some feedback. Brian- "The Sweeping Carrier". This was exactly as
described in EMIGHA, and a most unusual find. The only possible use 1
can imagine for it, would be to keep those frequencies clear for soae
reason . There appears to be no logical link between the frequencies
chosen , neither does there seem to be any service using these
frequencies" .
Hike in Kent sent in soae observations and mentions that it sometimes
missed out 7680 kHz. Hike also says that the signal strength could
also vary in just half an hour from S9+ to 'no sig' and applied
equally to all frequencies but had no regular pattern , not deliberate,
and wasn't selective fading. Mike also add that perhaps it is a slow
speed version of the Ptarmigan VHF/0HF frequency hopping system . *
This signal was last noted operating in October 1996 and has not been
heard since.
(♦-Unlikely - Ptarmigan is a military voice communications spread
spectrum system. This 'thing' however, carries no sign of voice
intelligence. )
Your comments/observations most welcome.
The Czech Stations - continued from ENIGMA, _Q
by M.G
First of ail* Mil, which is referred to in the previous
article has now been deleted. It originated in the confusion
of stray unaccounted-for Mis, and our understanding of Ml's
varied patterns and disguises has now much improved. Hi is
not part of the Czech network. Also, due to inconsistent use
of our designation numbers, Sii (2nd para. page 34) should
read S 17, our familiar daily 'control ' station. Sii
("presta**) has no Czech connections. Apologies for this.
Having cleared all that up, we can now look at the OLX family.
OLX as we know it today was in operation by March 1992, and
could well have begun on 1st January. This came after a major
reorganisation of this network and its role. Its
predecessors, M6A/S15, ended at around December 1990 possibly
at the same time as SiO* It shared several similarities to
OLX tout also had many dif f erences. Like OLX it operated in
both morse and voice and used a regular set of 3 fig IDs. Its
main differences were its more complex scheduling and the use
of null message formats, which were much more frequent than
actual messages. The present OLX is opaque as regards null
luggages — we don't know which of its messages are valid and
which are dummies, making traffic analysis impossible. Group
counts also tend 'to be generally longer on M&/S16.
M6A & Sib used no callsign, official or otherwise. It- merely
began with a string of rapid dots (XCW for M6A, MCfol for S15)
as a tuning signal, sent for 5 minutes prior to the
* broadcast' , which started, unlike OLX, at any 5min interval
of the hour. The 3f ig ID, sent for the next 5min was selected
from a fixed number of IDs, as with M6/S16, however, a number
of arbitrary null message IDs were also used which always
included a zero. These gave the listener warning that no
message would follow - actually transmission cut off abruptly
at the end of the call. They could also possibly have carried
operational instructions within their make-up. In effect, all
these IDs acted as both Schedule numbers and msg/no-msg
indicators. An expected schedule number was replaced by a
null message ID whenever necessary. Simon Mason was incorrect
when he stated in his book, 'Secret Signals' , that the
.recipient would have to endure. ... five minutes of brain-
numbing ' dva tri asm' , ad nauseam, only to be rewarded by a
sudden departure l " . Incidental ly , the example given, 238,
would have resulted in a message anyway, as it doesn't contain
a zero!
Format followed present lines from then on, i.e. GC (once) -
message of single of groups, "opakujil M (Czech for " I repeat**,
not "Papaqui" as quoted by LP - there is no such word and no
letter 'Q' in Czech) then a repeat of GC and msg , ending with
"Konec" (pronounced quite conventionally in Czech as 'konets
in English phonetics and never written "Conet” - a la
45
Pierce 1 ) * Another very similar station, S5, the one referred
to by LF$ used the QLX call of today, used null message IDs,
and sent the GC j>*ice before each message. As no dates are
given , it's not clear where this one fits in. LP implies that
S5 ended in 1989, and in his example gives it as using a non-
repeated GC* It is all yery confusing! Due to Morsephobia
prevalent among amateur numbers monitors at that time, M6A has
been sadly neglected, and little information exists, however,
it is likely that morse constituted about half of this
network s transmissions , as is the case today. Then, it could
well have used different freqs than its voice counterpart -
7413kHz being one of its regulars. Its format was very
similar to today's Ii6, the ©LX tuning signal being replaced by
rapid dots, however. Its call consisted of the ID sent six
times - as today - followed by = Oil or 012 and perhaps a few
other variations on this theme, all this sent for Smins . The
meaning of this auxilliary 3fig group is uncertain. One
theory reported was that it referred to number of messages.
Oil meaning one msg to follow, 012 two msgs etc. If this is
correct, it seems a long-winded way of doing it. Whatever its
purpose, it persists today but only, it would seem, in the Oil
form, clearly serving no purpose, a mere relict of times when
it did. There are many similar cases of inertia in the
numbers station sphere where parts of a system have outlived
their purpose yet persist. Why? A lack of will to remove
them or admit that they are redundant, or maybe even a
nostalgic affection for a station's past glories. The fact
that the voice arm of this network has never included this
extra group is another anomaly; it may suggest that the morse
and voice arms had different origins and maybe different roles
also.
Scheduling and frequency use are the most significant changes
which took place between the earlier and present forms of this
network. Almost all S15 freqs reported were below 7MHz and
were not used in parallel. They were: 3238 3380 3458 3465
4065 4104 (or 4014) 4160 4560 4790 5270 5770 5775 6780 8159
10180. This implies Europe-only coverage. Only one of these,
5775 was used by M6/S16 later than Jan 93. Although LP claims
that it used many of these earlier freqs, he also includes six
new freqs which were certainly solely in use by 1993. It is
more likely that, from its inception, S16 adopted a whole new
set of freqs along with its unique legitimate status. It is
the only numbers station that carries an official ITU-
registered callsign (excluding the dubious 4X2, and DEA47
which was farced by embarrassment into doing so) - 0LX -
formerly allocated to Ceteka News Agency. It is the only such
station which has the courtesy to reply to reception reports
from listeners, and even has its own QSL card. (see cover of
ENIGMA 6) On this card it lists its winter and summer freqs
relevant at that time: 3239 3280 3333 4601 4757 5301 6280 6758
6865 6958 7577 8142 9353 10125 10307 11002 11416 11585 14977
15897 16046 18303 20865 22910.
4rl*
This list implies worldwide coverage. Of these Si6 has
actually used: 3280 4601 5301 (5775 - not listed) 6280 6758
8142 11002 11416 14977 & 18303 , at least since early 1993.
(Two further freqs have been used since this list was
compiled: 9320 & 12275). The omission of 5775 is significant
for it is the only frequency which links it to the
unregistered, and therefore international ly illegal r4pid dots
stations. In their unprecendented decision to legitimise a
numbers station a whole new set of freqs (three to be used in
parallel at any one time) was chosen as part of its new image
and new post-Cold War role. The use of 5775 could have been a
minor oversight and was quite short-1 ived .
M6/S16 scheduling is far simpler than its predecessors* Forty
schedule numbers are used as IDs - 18 voice, 22 morse. These
are allocated to 161 hourly time slots throughout the week
(omitting 2300 - for transmitter maintenance?) Each t number is
used either three or four times a week and has its own regular
time slots. All transmissions carry a message (GC 40-150) and
rarely two, and there is no way for the uninitiated of telling
which are valid. It is th© busiest and most consistent of
numbers stations.
Further notes on 0LX, and the remaining Czech stations S17 and
th© elusive Czech Man (S18,S19) will be covered in a later
issue.
- ****t******t**t****ttt%t*ttt******tttt**tt*t%*$t*%$tttttttts%z
Many thanks to Andreas for his excellent material, much of
which we hope to include in a proposed definitive book on
numbers stations, of which none exist at present. ENIGMA
Newsletter is primarily for reporting news and changes in the
Numbers scene - a book would complement the NL by providing
the increasing quantity of reference material needed to make
full use of the news we provide. It would be invaluable both
to newcomers and experienced monitors, as it would cover all
aspects of a very complex little-known subject.
t*tttt*t***tt***t*tt****t***t*tttttt*t*tt**tttttt*tt*tt*tttttt
HELP NEEDED . • <'
Any information on the 'Stay Behind Networks' ("Gladio" etc),
which (we are told) disbanded in the early 1990s, would be
much appreciated. The last Allied Co-ordinating Committee
meeting took place on 23/24.10.90 where its reorganisation was
discussed. The ACC was formerly known as the Clandestine
Planning Committee, and before that as the Clandestine
Committee of the Western European Union. Details of their
radio communication networks and regular radio exercises is
especially welcome. This has a bearing on the activities of
certain numbers stations.
DZ - inf rec'd 777/4
47
— Snbilttod by Simon Mnatm.
The following first appeared in the Washington Post and highlights the
career of the American crypotan&lyst Meredith Knox Gardner, 85 this
year .
Soviet spy chiefs thought they had devised an unbreakable code for
common icat ing with agents in VWII . The systea consisted of several
layers, each of which had to be systematically “stripped away“ by
cryptanalysts :
Cover names concealed identities and places. For example, Lt Gen.
ravel Fitin, the head of foreign intelligence in Moscow, was code-
n amed YIKTOR. Washington was known as CARTHAGB, Julias Rosenberg as
AlxHM (later changed to LIBERAL) and President Roosevelt as CAPTATM
Soviet cipher clerks used a code book to translate a message into
numbers, expressed in 4F groups. Using this system, the group 0956
represented VIKTOR, the group 1853 signified a full stop and so on.
In order to further disguise the codes, the Soviets added to the®
numbers from previously distributed cipher pads. A code clerk in Sew
York took digits froa the pad and added them to the code, without
carrying numbers forward. If the next digits were 0359, for example,
VICTOR (0956) would beooae 0205. Each word in the cable was assigned
its own cipher, so even if the word VIKTOR was repeated in a telegram,
it would look different.
The code clerk in Moscow performed the same operation in reverse,
using an identical .cipher pad as the eneoder. Had ^the Soviefcs
consistently used each pad only "once, the ■' system would have
impregnable. ; In ^ 1942, however, they began duplicating some of the
pads, probably in order to accommodate a large increase in cable
traffic. This "turned out to be a " fatal flaw that made the American
code bri»ak possible.
In the autumn of 1943, an American cryptanalyst, Richard Halcoek,
found evidence of the us® of duplicate key pads by searching through
the cable traffic for repetition of the. same number. A colleague,
Cecil Phillips, made statistical observations that enabled the code
breakers to break into the cipher system used by Soviet intelligence.
Hallcock, Phillips and their colleagues eventually discovered 35,000
pages of duplicates in traffic between Moscow, Mew York, Washington,
San Francisco, London, Montevideo and Canberra. By searching for
repetitive phrases, American cryptanalysts were gradually able to
“strip" away the cipher.
The key pads had been randomly distributed to Soviet intelligence,
trade and diplomatic missions. So it was that the repetitive, fairly
predictable nature of the trade messages that helped the cryptanaylsts
break into the intelligence messages.
Workers, mostly women reoruited direct from civilian life, tested
millions of different permutations with the help of IBM punoh cards.
Once the additive key had been stripped away, cryptolinguists like
Gardner were able to slowly compile a Russian code book.
Gardner broke the special subcode for individual English letterswhich
enabled him to read a list of scientists associated with the Kanhatten
project. The following year, he translated the first references to
Julius and Ethel Rosenborg.
Simon Mason Writes
Hello once again and welcome to another column. The main feature this
time is a review of the ‘'Shortwave Eavesdropper’ 4 CD-ROM from
Interproducts . This product is mainly of use to general Utility
monitors and an excellent tool it is.
As with most CD-ROM data bases* it has versatile search capabilities.
You can search for callsigns, search between two frequencies, search
for SKLCALS , ship's names and callsigns and so on. Of course, the
searches can be restricted to certain criteria. For example, you can
select a country and user to highlight certain number stations .
Select the U.X. ahd a series of different user types appear, one of
which is the H.O J, . Start the search and all the Piccolo 20 baud
stations on the data base are listed.
Select the If .S.A. together with the C.I.A. and a long list of the 3/2F
(E5) stations appear.
Alternatively, if you select Russia and all users in A.M. mode then a
list of Russian operators, male and female, in English, German,
Spanish and Russian are produced.
Another impressive feature is where you can simply enter a data mode
and the most likely users are highlighted. Select Piccolo 20 baud and
the British Amy, Air Force, navy and Diplomatic services are shown.
Some old callsigns are retained. For example, if you type in DFC37,
the the CD-ROM comes up with the German Intelligence Service located
in Pullach* on 3370 kHz. HEP is listed solely as Switzerland, DEA47 as
being German Intelligence again and interestingly, 8BY is recorded as
belonging to a long list of daily tactical callsigns as used by
H.A.T.0.+
The whole CD-ROM contains about 114 MB of data and by far the majority
of this consists of sound files containing extracts of off-air
recordings. The data modes first : By selecting “Audio guide to data
modes", you can listen to quite a number of various sounds including;
RTTY, ARQ, FAX, FEC, Coquelet 8, Crowd 30, Piccolo idle and Piccolo
traffic. There are even 3 types of voice scrambling methods included.
Of course, the most interesting part for number station fans are the
recordings of Spy transmissions included, and, while these are a
welcome addition, 1 felt a little disappointed that there were only
20. I realise the the CD-ROM is primarily a data base of utility
frequencies and that anything else is a bonus, however, as stated
previously, the CD-ROM contains 114 MB of data and a CD-ROM can hold
well over 600MB, so there is ample room for many more recordings.
Indeed I have recently transferred recordings of my own which contain
nearly 80 different stations, on' to my hard drive. These take up about
70 MB of space, so I feel there was plenty of scope to add ©ore than
the 20 stations on offer.
(♦Transmitters not there. This is their H.Q. - Eds)
(+& clear piece of disinformation ! It's not a tactical callsign -Eds)
*9
That nai d„ thwrss are one or two Interesting stations on the CD-ROM.
Here is a list of those included:
I) E5 YL/EK Counting Station 2) E3 Lincolnshire Poacher, tune and
traffic
3) E10 Alpha Phonetic traffic & CI02 Call-up
4) S2 Bugle Call-up 5} S21 Russian Lady
6) S8 Russian Man 00000 7) E6 English Man 00000
6} GIB 2 Letter station using pre-1988 real YL voice
9) G16 Same as 8, but with different YL voice
10) G18 With rare “Lina Romeo" call sign
II) G13 5 Dashes station 12) S10 Czech Lady with 5 tones &
traffic
13) ¥1 Skylark tune and 0M with Romanian traffic
Finally, there are three very interesting recordings. Firstly, the
$4 ""Edna Sednifczer““ station, which is quite a rare recording.
Then a portion of a broadcast by the S23 0M which uses the “Leopold,
Ulrich, Ludwig 84 class of phonetic letters and finally an on -class if led
recording of a YL/EE who says 2 as tooo, a voice I have heard before,
but can't quite place !
All in all then a very worthwhile CD-ROM data base to have, although
it would have been better to have filled it up to nearer the 800 MB
mark with lots of extra recording.
The “Shortwave Eavesdropper 08 CD-ROM cost £25.00, including UL&. post
or airmail worldwide. Details from Interproducts, 8 Abbot Street,
Perth, PH2 QBE, Scotland. EKIGMA has no connection with Interproducts.
IS ext some news that the editor of the “Communications Confidential “
column in the U.S. magazine, “Popular Communications" , Don Schimmel
has ended his long tenure, for reasons he explaines here:
The January 1997 column will be my final column for Popular
Communications magazine. I want to thank you for all of your past
contributions of photographs, QSLs, loggings, information, etc., for
use in the column. Your support was greatly appreciated.
Many CQ Communications, Inc., writers are owed significant sums of
money for submitted columns and/or articles and delays in payment have
been up to 8 months or more. Some of the CQ Communications, Inc.,
publications have been discontinued.
5o
Four other column editors hsnm slao stopped writing for Popular
Communications due to the late payment policy. tilth the monthly
average for Popular Communications subscriptions going from 31,745 to
23,861 ( 1990-1995), a decrease of over 20%, it just seemed that the
situation would not improve any time soon.
The one bright spot has been the pleasure I have had working with you.
Perhaps SML paths will cross again in the near future. 1 do plan to
attend the Kulpsville, PA, SWL Festival 13-15 March 1997 and hope to
see some of you there .
I would like to thank Don for all his help during the last 10 years.
All that time ago there were virtually no places where Humber Station
issues could be aired in an International forum and Don's column was a
kind of meeting place for all monitors interested in the mystery.
Over the years, many monitors have come and gone but I would like to
give a name check to all of the contributors I came to know through
Don's column. They are Tom in Kansas, Reino in Joensau Finland, David
in South Korea, Akin in London, Tom Mazanec, Richard Baker, Kevin
Tubbs, Ary in The Netherlands, Gary Hamlin, Tom Kneital, Dave White
and the late Havana Moon.
How onto some of my monitoring and station news, first the 2 Letter
stations. There seems to be only two stations now still in operation.
Golf Kilo in German (G16) and Mike Delta in English (E16) .
Whisky Lima was last noted in January on SUM at 04-00 on 5770, more
regular daytime transmissions have not however been heard since July
1996.
Here is a current (incomplete) schedule of the remaining 2 Letter
stations.
GolfKilo
MOM
TOE
MED
TH0
ERI
SAT
SUM
AUGUST
21.30
8063
21.30
8063
21.30
7858
21.30
8173
21.30
7404
SEPTEMBER
19.00
9040
20.30
8853
19.00
9040
OCTOBER
20.00
6853
21.00
5770
20.30
5732
NOVEMBER
22.30
4821
22.00
5182
22.30
4543
20.30
4880
DECEMBER
22.30
4543
01.30
4543
21.00
4594
20.00
4594
21.30
4594
20.30
4888
22.00
5284
22.30
4821
01.30
4594
22.30
3228
JANUARY
20.00
5015
21.00
4821
Alpha Uniform in
occasionally and is
English has
still active.
also
been noted on
4888//4821
Hike Delta currently heard at 09.00 on either 12314 or 13775 and at*
14.00 on 18414. Seems to he primarily Tuesday and Saturday.
Before leaving the subject of the 2 Letter stations, I no£ed in
Popular Communications that a monitor in Hew York had sent in a
logging of & German language 2 Letter station called H Kove»ber Quebec"
sending 5F groups at 12.00 on' a previously unknown frequency, namely
15990 k Hz. 1 have listened on this frequency on a near daily basis
since reading the report but have not heard the station - perhaps this
is one of those strange occasions when known European stations are
sent from sites in the continental U.S.A. and therefore at certain
times of the day are difficult to hear in Europe.
How a look at some recent loggings, including a rare mistake from
Swedish Rhapsody <G2) .
First some unusual (E10> Alpha Phonetic strings noted recently.
4665
03.45
- 22.45
SYN-R
161800
Answers on
a postcard
4665
22.45
- 03.45
SYS
7Z9180500
please !
4665
22.45
- 01.45
SYS
9180500
6745
06.45
- 06.50
SYS-L
644P16
Please also
> see our
6745
18.45
- 18.50
SYS-P
406F554
feature on
these message
6745
17.45
- 17.50
SYM-FF
36 B504T26
strings in
this issue.
6745
21.45
- 21.50
SYS-L
381D504
Station CI02 was also heard using the unusual frequency of 8860 kHz
for a while, but now seems to have settled on a new frequency of 5530
kHz, which is also used by the "Haney Adam Susan" (EX5) station at
20.00, luckily CIO transmits between 45-50 minutes after the hour, but
it will be interesting to hear those rare occasions when CIO sends a
Message or string.
On 1 Hovember at 19.20 a YL/GG (G7) was sending 764,764,784,1 then
8228/78 6226/78 and into 5F groups. Only trouble was... It was almost
obliterated by "The Buzzer" on 4825 kHz.
A broadcast by the Swedish Rhapsody station was due on 27 Hovember at
22.00 on 5340 kHz judging by the series of tone being sent 5 minutes
before the hour. However at 22.00 the tones stopped and were followed
by a German YL who said "Achtung" once at 22.01. At 22.03 the usual
"Swedish Rhapsody" tune was sent for 5 minutes, followed at 22.08 by
the usual YL with 3 headings and eventually into 5F groups.
To close, I heard and taped on Christmas Day at 20.45 an Alpha-
Phonetic station YL (E10) repeating for 5 minutes on 6598 kHz ! To go
with the unusual frequency, the YL was repeating "Hovember Delta Papa
- Victor" HDP-V. I have not heard anything since on this frequency.
HDP is one of those occasional (E10) callsigns. *
That's about all for now, until next time.
* 6600/6598 has actually been quite active ~ see page 5
52 .